How the L-1B Can Work For You (Ⅰ)

The intra-company transferee visa (L-1) is available to employees of multi-national companies who are being transferred to a parent, subsidiary, branch, or affiliated company in the US. The L-1 visa may be used to transfer an executive or manager, an employee who has within the preceding three years been employed abroad as an executive or manager for one continuous year by a qualifying organization, or a specialized knowledge employee, an employee with specialized knowledge of the products, services or procedures of the organization, to the United States. In both cases the foreign national employee has to have been employed abroad by the qualifying organization for one continuous year in the three years preceding the filing of the petition.

For decades, the L-1 nonimmigrant classification for intra-company transferees has been a useful method for multinational companies to transfer employees to the United States, particularly after the standards were liberalized by the Immigration Act of 1990 (IMMACT90).

Indeed, the L-1 classification has many advantages over other types of nonimmigrant classifications, including:

1.         no annual limits on the number of foreign nationals who can qualify for the category,

2.         no prevailing wage standards,

3.         dual intent whereby a foreign national can apply for permanent residence without an adverse impact on the nonimmigrant status