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L1A individual after L1A blanket denial | Chennai
I went for my L1A blanket visa interview on 17th Sep with wife and kid. It was denied. Interview went as follows:
I wished her good morning, no response. Asked for passports. Pretty serious looking lady.
1. Which visa? L1A blanket (asked me for the docs)
2. Which company?
3. Designation?
4. Who I report into?
5. Location?
6. US salary?
7. Why are they sending you? I misunderstood this question as why I was chosen over others. My answer may have seemed like a specialization which is L1B and not L1A. I should’ve just explained my role. I expected more questions on my role.
She said my visa is not clearly approvable and I should apply in a different category. I wished she rephrased her question or asked me more questions to understand my role better.
Super disappointed but my company decided to file L1A individual visa under premium processing. They filed in October 2019. Got RFE in November 2019. Response filed in Jan 2020 (374 pages). Got approval in Feb 2020. Found an interview slot for April 15, 2020. Kept checking regularly and after a week found March 4, 2020 slot.
This is how the interview went this time. The VO greeted us warmly.
1. What’s the purpose of your travel? I answered it’s an international assignment and am applying for L1A individual. He asked me for my 797 approval notice.
2. Which company? One of the largest US banks
3. Designation? Senior Manager (analytics)
4. Who I report into? Senior Director
5. Are you born at ZZZ? I didn’t expect this. He asked again and I answered Yes.
6. Which location? Answered
7. Salary? $1XX,000 + bonus
8. Experience with company? 8 years
9. How many reportees? 6
10. How many indirect reportees? 3
11. (Showing me my China visa in the passport) You traveled to China? Oh, that was in 2015 for a business conference. He replied, glad it wasn’t recent and laughed (guess he was concerned about the virus)
Then he looked at my wife and asked
12. (To wife) How long are you married? 13 years (I started feeling confident now as questions got personal)
13. (To kid) Which grade? Answered
14. (To wife and me) Did you have any police cases or had to visit courthouse on your previous visits? We smiled and answered no. (I traveled 10 times in the last 7 years on B1 and wife traveled last year with me on B2)
VO: Everything looks in order and all your visas are approved.
We thanked him and walked away.
Pointers:
1. The visa process can be daunting and long. Hang on!
2. L1 blanket visa interviews are tough. The government has no documentation on you and the interview is the decider. Prepare super well and read about decision criteria on USCIS website. Research on why your visa can be denied and prepare against it.
3. L1 individual category is better as government scrutinizes your case and approves even before the interview. Hence the interview is more factual than judgmental.
4. Always go for premium processing. Else you can get stuck for a long time.
5. Prepare for the questions you see on this site but also prepare for drill down questions for each.
6. RFE is not bad. You can bombard them with so much documentation that your case will seem super genuine. For me, they asked degree certs, tax returns, org charts of my teams both in India and the US apart from a lot of other stuff.
7. I dressed in a formal shirt and jeans. Last time I wore a blazer too. It just made me more nervous and uncomfortable I guess.
8. Zone out while you are in the queue. Don’t listen to other interviews or rattle your brain with your prepared answers. You will just tense up.
Understand this well. The interview is just one small part of the process. You are selected for the role by your company which is a BIG deal. There are other things which are out of your control – like your salary and your role. If you don’t get the visa it should be because of those and not your answers. Just prepare well and answer truthfully.
If you have any questions, do feel free to contact me. I would love to help you guys.
Finally, this forum and the people contributing are amazing. It helped a lot.
We are flying in April and are hoping it will all work out.
I wished her good morning, no response. Asked for passports. Pretty serious looking lady.
1. Which visa? L1A blanket (asked me for the docs)
2. Which company?
3. Designation?
4. Who I report into?
5. Location?
6. US salary?
7. Why are they sending you? I misunderstood this question as why I was chosen over others. My answer may have seemed like a specialization which is L1B and not L1A. I should’ve just explained my role. I expected more questions on my role.
She said my visa is not clearly approvable and I should apply in a different category. I wished she rephrased her question or asked me more questions to understand my role better.
Super disappointed but my company decided to file L1A individual visa under premium processing. They filed in October 2019. Got RFE in November 2019. Response filed in Jan 2020 (374 pages). Got approval in Feb 2020. Found an interview slot for April 15, 2020. Kept checking regularly and after a week found March 4, 2020 slot.
This is how the interview went this time. The VO greeted us warmly.
1. What’s the purpose of your travel? I answered it’s an international assignment and am applying for L1A individual. He asked me for my 797 approval notice.
2. Which company? One of the largest US banks
3. Designation? Senior Manager (analytics)
4. Who I report into? Senior Director
5. Are you born at ZZZ? I didn’t expect this. He asked again and I answered Yes.
6. Which location? Answered
7. Salary? $1XX,000 + bonus
8. Experience with company? 8 years
9. How many reportees? 6
10. How many indirect reportees? 3
11. (Showing me my China visa in the passport) You traveled to China? Oh, that was in 2015 for a business conference. He replied, glad it wasn’t recent and laughed (guess he was concerned about the virus)
Then he looked at my wife and asked
12. (To wife) How long are you married? 13 years (I started feeling confident now as questions got personal)
13. (To kid) Which grade? Answered
14. (To wife and me) Did you have any police cases or had to visit courthouse on your previous visits? We smiled and answered no. (I traveled 10 times in the last 7 years on B1 and wife traveled last year with me on B2)
VO: Everything looks in order and all your visas are approved.
We thanked him and walked away.
Pointers:
1. The visa process can be daunting and long. Hang on!
2. L1 blanket visa interviews are tough. The government has no documentation on you and the interview is the decider. Prepare super well and read about decision criteria on USCIS website. Research on why your visa can be denied and prepare against it.
3. L1 individual category is better as government scrutinizes your case and approves even before the interview. Hence the interview is more factual than judgmental.
4. Always go for premium processing. Else you can get stuck for a long time.
5. Prepare for the questions you see on this site but also prepare for drill down questions for each.
6. RFE is not bad. You can bombard them with so much documentation that your case will seem super genuine. For me, they asked degree certs, tax returns, org charts of my teams both in India and the US apart from a lot of other stuff.
7. I dressed in a formal shirt and jeans. Last time I wore a blazer too. It just made me more nervous and uncomfortable I guess.
8. Zone out while you are in the queue. Don’t listen to other interviews or rattle your brain with your prepared answers. You will just tense up.
Understand this well. The interview is just one small part of the process. You are selected for the role by your company which is a BIG deal. There are other things which are out of your control – like your salary and your role. If you don’t get the visa it should be because of those and not your answers. Just prepare well and answer truthfully.
If you have any questions, do feel free to contact me. I would love to help you guys.
Finally, this forum and the people contributing are amazing. It helped a lot.
We are flying in April and are hoping it will all work out.
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