H4 to H1 : Fresh H1 or COS?

[blossomgreen]

Greetings...!!

I am currently on leave from my employer in India and staying with my husband in US with H4 and have around 4 yrs of IT experience. Kindly help me in deciding the best option for filing H1:

1. Conversion of H4 to H1 visa status from US itself through a consulting company. (Processing in US)
2. Filing fresh visa from my current employer which is a reputed MNC (stamping will be done from India)

I am confused as I find more risk in going back to India on my own expenses and trusting my employer for visa filing.

Please suggest the best option in terms of success rate of fresh H1 filing from India or change of status from H4 to H1.

Thanks In Advance

[meeunda]

Both has its merits and demerits.
I guess in both the cases, your effective working date would be Oct'12.

1. Conversion of H4 to H1 visa status from US itself through a consulting company. (Processing in US)

Consulting firms are not trust worthy. Also you may need to share huge earnings to them (mostly 40%) and also you may need to pay towards your visa processing for about 5K to 10K $ which is illegal.


2. Filing fresh visa from my current employer which is a reputed MNC (stamping will be done from India)

This is safe and legal. Your job is secured.
Though you have to go back to India and file Visa from the employer, is he ready to process your visa starting this April?
Also you have to wait until Oct to travel back to US on H1 in case if it is approved.

Choice is yours

[shervin143]

Well, you can file a COS from H4 to H1B and if that gets approved with a new I-94, you can work from Oct 1st (assuming it is a fresh CAP). The issues with the consultancy companies are, there will be muliple layers between you and the client and that will cause issues when yuo go for H1B stamping later. See ifyou can find a fulltime employment with a good company or at least a reputed consultancy company that doesn't involve any layers between them and the client. Even your current Indian employer (assuming they have an office in U.S to sposor H1B) can file a COS from H4 to H1B and when that gets approved, you can start working for the employer in U.S.