Your time for
getting to the US on an H1-B
this year is
running out. Fast.
With the quota having
brought back down from 195,000 to 65,000
for
the year, the situation has suddenly changed from not enough applicants – as
was the case in 2003 – to far too many chasing the limited number of visas
available.
Some estimates say the quota could be reached as early as
March or even February. Siskind Susser PC, an Atlanta-based immigration firm
believes that’s the outer limit.
(Is a job in the US still your
dream?)
There are as many as 20,000 or so applications pending from
last year already. So fresh applicants will have to take their place at the end
of a queue that’s already formidably long.
One way to ensure you’re not out of the race is to opt for
the fast-track review – the accelerated 15-day process. Not paying the premium
will mean having to wait the normal three to six-month period, by which times
this year’s quota will definitely be gone.
Indeed, the premium of Rs 46,000-and-odd, at current
dollar-rupee prices, is no guarantor that your application will get a decision
before the quota runs out. It will only ensure you’re not eliminated even
before you get off the starting blocks.
Indians seeking H1-Bs this year have one more problem: the
effective quota they’re competing for is not 65,000 but only 58,200. That’s
because 6,800 H1-B visas are reserved for people from Singapore and Chile as
part of trade agreements signed with those countries by the US.
The quota has been brought down this year partly because
there have not been 195,000 applications for new H1-B visas in recent years.
Last year, for instance, there were 215,190 applications for both fresh visas
and renewals, with 197,537 of them being approved. But only about 80,000 of
these were for fresh visas.
Significantly, as many as 64,980 of those had their H1-Bs
granted or renewed were Indians, with Chinese nationals a distant second with
18,841.
In 2002, 331,206 of the 342,035 H1-B applications for fresh
visas and renewals were approved, compared to 257,640 and 299,046,
respectively, in 2002.
With time running out fast, the one slice of hope for Indian
pros who don’t make the cut is that Washington may just raise the cap on H1-Bs
if the quota runs out so early in the year.
Companies
like Intel are known to be asking
for such a relaxation, although there are a number of Bills before the US
Congress seeking to impose severe restrictions on H1-B visas.
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