L1, L2 Visa

Experts here kindly suggest me for below query.

 My company for which i used to work in India is offering me a job here in USA. Currently, I am on H4 VISA. Can i ask my company file for my L1B VISA while i am here at USA for this job offer as it is only 5 months since i moved here before quitting in India?

Is there any legal requirement that i should be currently working for filing L1B visa or any other thing? I have over five years of experience with the company in India that i am offered role for in USA.

Kindly suggest on this!

L1B (Family) approved Chennai 12th MAR

First of all thanks a million to this portal. This is very helpful and thanks to everyone contributing.
I faced a L1B visa rejection before getting a L1 individual. This interview again for a L1B was very scary for me. I went through all the questions in the portal and prepared for any possible scenarios.

But reality was such a pleasant experience.

Me (family): Good morning Sir, my name is -----, my wife and daughter we are here for L1B and L2 visas today.
VO: Give me your passports
Me: Gave it to him
VO: who is your petitioner?
Me: answered
VO: You have a L1 before which was from a different petitioner.
Me: Yes Sir. Xx company was fully owned subsidiary for my company. But now all the companies are merged to my bank. We now have only one brand name.
VO: why did you not get a H4 for your kid.
Me: Sir that was back in 2007-2009. She was not born at that time.
VO: Please wait for few mins. I have to attend to a old person and she needs my assistance
Me: Sure Sir, please take your time.
After 10 mins of waiting
VO: sorry abt that. What will be you salary
Me: xxxx + bonus
VO: what will be your location
Me: NY sir
VO: with a smiley face your company has so many office in NY, which location in NY.
Me: gave the street address.

VO: which school you are studying
Kid : school and class

VO: What will you do in US. You will miss your friends.
Kid: smiled

After few minutes of typing, all your visa is approved.

All the very best to everyone applying.

Hi all,

As per the latest update, all immigrant and non immigrant visa appointment's are cancelled.

Is it true?

My visa appointmemt scheduled on march 30 in Hyderabad location.

Please give me anyone update about this?

Thabk you

Hi Guys,

I would like to share my experience here,

my interview date is Feb 25 2020 at Vancouver ,canada.

I went for L1-A blanket and it approved. The below questions asked

Questions are

1) Where are you working
2)are you doing managerial role
3)how many reportees
4)annual salary
5)what is your current designation

I wanted to share my trip details here. it will help who will be going for canada to get visa.

I am living East USA. i am trying to get visa location as ottawa which is near for me. but unfortunately i got vancouver which is west canada.
I choose to go to seattle ,WA and from there by car/train. my friends were advice me to go via amtrak which is save some cost instead of rental car. I booked flight from JFK to Seattle (109$/ticket, pricline website) on saturday. Even though my interview date was Feb 25 2020(Tuesday). avoid very close travel. I have friend in seattle i stayed their home two days and Monday morning i started from seattle and go to amtrak railway station but unfortunately i booked bus service in amtrak (135$/4 tickets). Some ocnfusion(train/bus) happened but not an issue. the bus travel also very good.

I booked Airbnb house Feb 25 to Feb 29 (40$ for five nights) other than cleaning charge +tax total per night 70$ came. Very nice home and Hasting area from here US Counslate (10 mins) travel, Frequent bus service available. but first two days i booked yellow cab only. only T-Mobile USA number will be working in canada. Please before fly get some T-Mobile sim which was very useful for me but for me no data activiated. So i choose yellow taxi and booked for travel. after visa interview completed, we were using public transport only which very affordable.

Interview process explained by others in this site already so i dont want mention here.

For my case:

VO officer was good and one advantage for me, I was already under L1-A individual working in USA. When he saw my L1-A, he asked oh you were already in L1-A individual ,i replied yes, working as project manager. then he saw my dependent passport and asking same question they are all L2 individual ok. Then i had some confident and started asking the above questions while discussing he tick approval box in the form. stamp there. but he got all the I-129s(two copies) and passport. He replied email will come for pick up. I left with thank him.

Be confident and talk bold with smile and cool.
 
I got the passport ready for pick up on Feb 28 2020. totally three days took and i booked the flight on same day 10PM . i landed US.

Hello All.

Thanks for sharing the details of your experiences and process here. It has been immensely helpful for me over the past few months. I am putting up my experience from the past week.

My company (mid sized product company) had initially planned on an L1A blanket for me. I have direct reports (very small number) only in India and no direct reports currently planned in the US. In a conversation with the lawyer it emerged that L1A without direct reports in the US may be a problem. We then decided to go with L1B. It is a bit unusual case, because my future US job title is mentioned as engineering manager, but the visa category we chose was L1B. Current designation in India is engineer, but I have people reporting to me.

I was a bit worried about this odd combination of a manager title in US but L1B, and engineer title in India with direct reports. Hence, spent a lot of time going over various combination of questions/answers that may come up. Had a good set of answers ready to provide details on my specialization, including talking about my patent for the product.

The actual visa experience was quite simple though. It is very interesting to see that the company support letter does not even go to the VO. This along with any addendum pages (anything apart from first 8 pages of I129S) is removed by the first guy who helps you arrange the documents after you enter the visa office.

Questions were as follows --
1. What does your company do -- answered in a single sentence
2. Follow up question on an acronym I used -- answered in 3 words
3. How long have you worked with the company -- 4 y
4. Where will you be going -- answered with city name
5. What is your US salary -- 1xx,000 per yr
6. Another follow up question on the exact nature of work company does and the product I work on. VO was looking for a simple non-technical answer, but I may have gone too technical in choosing the initial terms. VO suggested a simple line and I smiled with VO and said it sounds good.

VO at this point said, please wait few few minutes while I approve your Visa. No questions/conversation with wife and kid.

Completed typing and handed over 2 copies of I129S and kept our passports.

Thank you all once again and wish you best in your endeavors.

Hi All,

I am currently holding Canadian PR that I had applied personally where I was the dependent and my spouse was primary applicant. I am currently in India and working for the same Indian employer.

My Indian company is now filing L1A blanket for me and I would like to know your views/experiences if holding a Canadian PR is going to have any positive/negative impact on my L1A application where I am the main applicant.

Any help is greatly appreciated. :)

Thank you.

Hello,

My company is planning to file L1B individual premium petition after the rejection of my L1B blanket petition. As part of this process, I was asked by our company attorney to give documentary evidences for trainings which I have undertaken and/or provided on my specialized knowledge. But unfortunately, I work for a product based company and my specialized knowledge is on the proprietary technologies/frameworks that our company uses and the domain knowledge that I have acquired by working on the product. I do have evidences for appreciations that I have got and multiple promotions that I got within the company.

Can you please let me know whether training certificates are essential in getting the petition approved?

I have also read similar experiences in this forum, but mostly I see people say to furinsh everything related to project etc. It would be great if I can get some help to know in bit more detail about the list o documents and the format in which the details have to be provided. Request your suggestions on the same.

Thanks a lot in advance.

Regards,
Sekhar

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.

Its pay it forward time:

Following is brief of my case history:
I was an AVP in Product Development company with 60 member team and 4 years ago my company moved me to US to start the PS - Solution Architecture practice as an Enterprise Solution Architect. I was a one man army then. 1 year into my US journey, my company was acquired and there was an influx of customers. Had to start building the team and they promoted me to the role of Practice Director and pursued L1A. My new role was a mix of People and Functional role.

L1B - Chennai, July 2016 - Approved
L1B Extension - Chennai, May 2019 - Approved
L1A - Chennai - Now

All my petitions were blanket.

Following are the questions asked:

Me: Good Morning, how are you doing today
VO: Good

Passed on my PP and 3 sets of 8 pates I149 and 1st page of I797

VO: Where do you work
Me: Company Name

VO: What does your company do?
Me: Started explaining and she said hold on :)

VO: What do you do?
Me: Started explaining how I started the SA practice with L1B, and the increase of workload because of the acquisition and the need to hire more resources. Told my new role in Building the SA practice and was explaining People Management side of it and she said again hold on :)

VO: So, looks like you have both People and Functional responsibilities as well
Me: Yes, very much in the foreseeable future.

VO: How long you have been with the Organization
Me: 9 years

VO: What keeps you motivated to stay so long?
Me: Learning

VO: What is your highest level of Education
Me: Master’s in computer science

VO: Were you on a blanket Visa earlier as well?
Me: Yes, I was on a L1B though

VO: How long have you been in US?
Me: 4 years

VO: What is your pay?
Me: X USD

VO: Do you work from your company location or client location?
Me: Company location

VO: Whom do you report to?
Me: I was telling the Name and designation, but she interrupted me again

VO: Tell me the designations till C level executive
Me: Told the designations

VO: How many direct reports do you have?
Me: 2 now, 2 are hiring in progress

VO: Any indirect reports
Me: My team does have, based on the projects. Right now, they have about 15 in total

VO: What is the total employee count
Me: Off late many acquisitions happened, and I lost count of it, may be around 2000.

VO: Ok

She picked the Stamp and stamped all 3 sets of I149+1797. VO was in a hurry, and was cutting short my answers

She did not say that my visa is approved, and I checked with her.

VO: Of course, and you know the drill with these documents right.
Me: Have a great rest of your day and stay safe

VO: Oh, thank you and you too.

Key was preparing a list of possible questions and your answers at least 10-15 days in advance. I started writing elaborate answers and as part of review (every other day) shortened the language without the cutting down the key words. This process went on for 10 days.

I was ready with my final answers 3 days before the interview and started doing mock interviews standing before a mirror.

Thanks for all who posted their experiences, and good luck for all who are seeking help.

Hi,
I had my L1 individual and L2(dependent) visa Interview on 05th March 2020 and here are the questions asked-
1) Do you work for xxx company?
2) How long you have been working there?
3) What is your salary in US?
4) Are you gonna work in client location ?
5) which is your work place? Which state is that?
6) what is your designation?
7) Explain your specialisation?
8) who is your client?
9) when did you get married?
10) Where does she works?
There was no question asked to my wife and after typing for about 3 minutes by looking at my I-797 she said your visa is approved and I can see the instruction in the green slip for collecting the passport and handed me the slip and kept the passports.