Guide to U.S. Immigration

5. The H Visa Category

An H-1B visa (formerly H-1) is available to those aliens who are considered to have speciality occupations. There is no requirement that the sponsoring company be the same nationality as the alien. The sponsoring company can be a foreign owned company (Japanese subsidiary company) or an American owned domestic company. The H-1B visa is issued for an initial period of three years and additional extensions are possible up to a maximum total of six years.

In order to qualify for an H-1B visa, the alien must generally attain a bachelor's degree in a professional area as a minimum qualification. Under some circumstances, a combination of education and experience can be substituted for bachelor's degree.

Some examples of H-1B visa professional occupations are engineers, architects, accountants, lawyers, teachers, and university professors. In some cases business positions can obtain an H-1B visa. These must be specialized business positions and require a bachelor's degree in economics or related major. This visa is attractive to a company that cannot qualify for an E or L visa.

As a condition to obtaining an H-1B visa, a labor condition application must be made by the employer in compliance with the rules of the Department of Labor. This labor condition application requirement makes this type of visa unattractive in some situations. Another requirement for an H-1B visa is that the employer must pay equal to or greater than the prevailing wage for the position. The prevailing wage is determined by a government agency and often the government determined prevailing wage does not reflect actual industry wages.

An H-1B visa differs from an E visa in that the sponsoring company makes an application with the nearest Citizenship & Immigration Services office in the US. The application is processed in the U.S. and if approved, the approval notice is sent to the American Embassy in Japan for further processing and issuance.

An H-2 visa is another category of the H visa. It is not a very useful visa because of the cumbersome paperwork involved. First a labor certification must be obtained from the Department of Labor certifying that no American workers are available for the temporary position sought. Then another petition must be filed with the Citizenship & Immigration Services. The visa is valid for only one year and the visa must be recertified by the Department of Labor and the Citizenship & Immigration Services if an additional year is desired. An example of an H-2 visa would be a Technician who trains local workers on the repair and maintenance of a new complicated electronic consumer product and after the training is finished, the Technician would return to Japan.

The H visa category also covers the H-3 visa. The H-3 visa category is for company trainees. An H-3 trainee can train in the U. S. for a period as long as two years. An example is a bank trainee who is in the U. S. under a management trainee program and is rotated between different departments of the bank. One requirement of an H-3 visa is that the majority of the trainee's time must be spent in curriculum based training and that the balance can be spent on-the-job training.

Both the H-2 and H-3 visas are filed at the nearest Citizenship & Immigration Services Office and if approved, the approval is sent to the U.S. Embassy/Consulate in Japan for processing and issuance.