The H-1B visa filing period for Fiscal Year 2017 begins on April
1, 2016, and filing H-1B visa petitions on that date is the best
plan for U.S. employers interested in hiring degreed skilled
foreign workers.
The H-1B visa category is a popular choice for U.S. companies
seeking to hire foreign professionals in specialty occupations
requiring Bachelor's degrees or the US equivalent. A very
limited number of visas are allocated annually for this visa
category, and over the past several years, the full quota has been
exhausted almost immediately.
If visa petitions received during the first five days of April
exceed the number of available visas, the government will conduct a
computer generated lottery to randomly select 85,000 visa petitions
for adjudication from all petitions received. The first 20,000 visa
petitions selected will be restricted to petitions on behalf of
applicants with Master's degrees or higher from qualifying US
educational institutions. The remaining petitions will then
be selected, and all other petitions will be returned to the
petitioning companies.
If you plan to file an H-1B visa petition this fiscal year, it is
important to start preparing your visa petitions now, since the
preliminary Department of Labor filing takes at least a week to be
certified.
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