Sept 11th - H-1B Employees

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Sept 11th is a significant day in American history. This day became more important for H-1B employees due to the three new memos that have been published recently.

Effective Sept 11th 2018,  USCIS may deny H-1B petitions without RFE (Request for Evidence) or NOID (Notice of Intent to Deny) if basic supporting documents like end client letter, implementation partner letter, prime vendor letter, itinerary, master service agreement and / work order between end client and implementation partner, master service agreement and / work order  between implementation partner and prime vendor, master service agreement and / work order between prime vendor and H-1B employer consulting company are not submitted along with the H-1B petition documents (I-129 and LCA ).

Effective Sept 11th, 2018, USCIS is also suspending premium processing at both Vermont and California Service centers. After Sept 11th an employer cannot request premium processing till Feb 19th, 2019.

Effective Feb 4th, 2019 the NTA (Notice to Appear) memo will affect H-B employees. If an H-1B extension is filed and the H-1B extension is denied after expiry of I-94, the H-1B employee can be issued a Notice to appear before a federal judge in an immigration court and subject to deportation proceedings after Feb 4th,2019. However, employers cannot request premium processing till Feb 19th, 2019.

These three memos have struck H-1B employees at the same time. You can request your employer to upgrade your H-1B petition to premium processing before Sept 11th to minimize the effect of these three memos.

If you have a H-1B extension pending and your employer has already received an RFE then there is no need to upgrade the petition to premium processing.

H-1B employees can file a second H-1B extension petition if they doubt that their extension will be denied.

Many smaller IT consulting companies do not have the knowledge to deal with boilerplate RFE’s on specialty occupation, employer employee relationship and education for H-1B employees.

We request H-1B employees who are subject to an imminent layoff or if their employer is filing their petition under the high denial rate SOC code 15-1121.00 - Computer Systems Analyst, to send their resume to [email protected] and we will help them find a new employer who can sponsor them.