An Intracompany Transferee Visa is available for an individual/beneficiary who has been continuously employed by a foreign employer/petitioner in a full-time position for one year within the three years preceding the time of the application and who seeks to enter the United States temporarily in order to continue to render his/her services to the same employer in a managerial or executive capacity. In order for an organization to qualify as the petitioner of an intracompany transferee, the organization must be doing business in the United States and in at least one other country for the duration of the alien’s stay in the United States. Moreover, the petitioner must be able to document the existence of foreign operations to which the employee can reasonably be expected to be transferred at the end of his or her assignment in the United States. The foreign employer must be a legal entity, i.e. firm or corporation, and must continue to do business for the duration of the alien’s stay in the U.S. in L-1 status.
The related U.S. based entity must be a “qualifying organization,” i.e. subsidiary, branch or affiliate. If your company does not already have a related company, it would be necessary for you to open a corporation here in the U.S. Our office can assist you with forming the U.S. corporation. The foreign employer/petitioner must be “doing business” which is defined as the regular, systematic and continuous provision of goods or services in the U.S. and at least one other country.
Once the corporation in the U.S. is formed, you may be transferred to the U.S. office in a position similar to the one you hold at the foreign company. As a holder of an L-l Visa, your spouse and children are is also entitled to accompany you to the U S. with L-2 Visas. While your spouse is not authorized to work with this visa, he or she may obtain a separate visa, if he/she is eligible, once she/he is here.
After the L-l is issued and the U.S. company has been operating successfully for one year, the company can petition for the employee to remain permanently in the U.S. At that time, a new petition is filed requesting an adjustment for the employee which will grant the individual and his family legal permanent residency, i.e. the “green card”.
Where the beneficiary is opening or will be employed in a new office:
A new office situation is one where an office has been doing business for less than one year. If the petition for classification of an alien as an intracompany transferee indicates that the beneficiary is coming to open or to be employed in a new office in the United States, the petitioner must submit evidence that (1) sufficient physical premises to house the new office have been secured (a lease contract and telephone number is usually sufficient); (2) as mentioned above, the beneficiary has been employed for one continuous year in the three year period preceding the filing of the petition in an executive or managerial capacity and the proposed employment involves executive or managerial authority over the new operation; and (3) the United States operation, within one year of approval of the petition, will continue to support an executive or managerial position.
Information regarding (1) the proposed nature of the office describing the scope of the entity, its organizational structure, and its financial goals; (2) the size of the United States investment and the financial ability of the foreign entity to remunerate the beneficiary and to commence doing business in the United States; and (3) the organizational structure of the foreign entity required to show that the operation will support the beneficiary in an executive or managerial position.
Although the L-1 visa is more burdensome then the H-1B visa in reference to the documentation that is required, it is usually easier to obtain. Also, unlike the H-1B visa, the L-1 visa is not subject to an annual quota. Attached is a list of the documentation needed to process this visa. Please note that the Immigration and Naturalization Service examines these petitions and documents carefully. Our office performs a preliminary evaluation of the company’s documents to determine whether your case should be filed.