Immigration Update with Lin Walker

Welcome to Season 2!

2021 has certainly had its share of challenges, and while we are hopeful that 2022 will see us pulling out of this pandemic and returning to normal, there are still many hurdles to overcome in the world of immigration for business, not the least of which is the enormous delays in processing of applications and petitions we have been seeing at USCIS.

In this first episode of the New Year, we examine some of the reasons for the delays and what you can do to get your application or petition processed as quickly as possible.

This week we received a lot of questions about traveling during the upcoming holidays and the ever-changing COVID restrictions and rules.

As 2021 comes to an end, many global travel restrictions have been lifted and we are entering the peak holiday travel season, so it’s important that we revisit the Form I-94, Arrival/Departure Record, and its importance to foreign nationals who enter the United States as nonimmigrants.

Discrepancies in the Arrival /Departure record is a problem we see here much too often at Meyner & Landis and often we’ve had to take emergency measures to prevent a client from being banned from entering the US for years, just from a simple mistake.

We’re hoping this podcast will help you avoid putting yourself in such a position.

This week we received an interesting question about a violation of nonimmigrant status and its impact on adjustment of status.

Immigration partner Lin Walker shares breaking news that affects international travel.

With the holiday season and peak travel time upon us, it is really essential to understand the COVID-19 related travel restrictions and requirements that have been recently implemented.

We’ve received some good questions over the past week about the third round of H-1B lottery selection for FY 2022 and the filing process.

As these selections happened on November 20th, it’s a good time to answer some of these fundamental questions.

Don’t forget to message us on LinkedIn any questions you would like us to answer next time.

Remember that all personal information is always kept confidential at Meyner and Landis, so the identity and personal details of those asking the questions are never disclosed.

The deadline to file H-1B cap petitions selected in the third round of the lottery for FY2022 is February 23, 2022.

One of the most important steps in preparing the H-1B petition is determining the appropriate prevailing wage for the Labor Condition Application.

Meyner and Landis LLP has created a tutorial video on how to determine the prevailing wage for H-1B petitions, as well as E-3 and H-1B1 petitions.

This week's podcast is the audio portion of that video, but you can also go to Lin Walker's Youtube Channel to watch it with the additional charts and other visual aids we have created.

The lightning round is a rapid fire Q&A where we answer YOUR questions sent to us via LinkedIn private message.

We’ve received some good questions over the past two weeks for our Lightning Round that we believe speak to how hot the current job market is in the United States.

It’s certainly no secret that there is a lot of movement in the workforce these days. And judging by the questions we received, our listeners are all over it.

We received more than a few questions about employment authorization for dependent family members and changing jobs as an L-1A and H-1B.

We revisit the deference policy, a key component in the Meyner and Landis toolbox of strategies for successfully responding to L-1A Requests for Evidence (RFEs).

We use two recent client success stories to illustrate how the deference policy can be utilized to increase the chances of approval.

This week’s Lightning Round is travel themed in honor of the upcoming holidays.

Lin and Kristen tackle questions such as…

Will the United States accept a combination of vaccines for travelers entering the U.S.?

What are the exceptions for travelers being fully vaccinated?

What are the difficulties of traveling while your status is pending, what to look out for in general if you are a foreign national traveling any time soon…and much more.