H-1B Lottery Conducted

As expected, the annual cap of 65,000 visas for H-1B non-immigrant workers in specialty occupations was reached before the cut-off for filing on April 7, 2008. The same was true for the additional 20,000 visas allocated for beneficiaries with advanced degrees such as U.S. master’s or higher.

From April 1 to 7, 2008, nearly 163,000 H-1B petitions for fiscal year 2009 were received by the United States Citizenship and Immigrations Services (USCIS). Of these, more than 31,200 H-1B petitions were for the advanced degree category.

Since the quota was met at such a rapid pace, all properly filed petitions were submitted for random selection. The H-1B submissions were labeled with unique numerical identifiers. These then went through a computer-generated lottery process to determine which cases would be forwarded to the appropriate immigration service centers for adjudication and which ones would be returned.

Two random selections were conducted on April 14.

First, the random selection for the U.S. master cap cases was conducted until the 20,000 cap was reached and those not chosen were moved to the general pool of H-1B petitions for selection. Then, the second random selection for the general H-1B 65,000 cap was conducted.

The selected H-1B petitions should be issued receipt notices dated no later than June 2, 2008. The estimated time frame for adjudication and processing is eight to ten weeks. Those that filed for premium processing and were chosen would be processed within a 15-day period starting April 14.

On the other hand, those not selected will be returned to the petitioners or their authorized representatives along with the filing fee(s). However, duplicate filings in violation of the USCIS guidelines will be rejected outright and their filing fees will be forfeited.

If for some reason, the H-1B petitions initially picked during random selection are later denied or withdrawn, the USCIS will pick a replacement from “wait-listed” H-1B petitions that were also randomly selected. The USCIS will inform the petitioners that are wait-listed.

This scenario was a repeat of last year’s clamor for H-1B visas when the cap was met on the very first day of filing (April 2). This year, however, the USCIS extended the filing dates for five business days from April 1 to 7, 2008. There was no priority given to those that filed earlier as long as the filing deadline was met. Moreover, last year, the quota of 20,000 for those with advanced degrees was filled only on April 30. This year, it was already oversubscribed by filing deadline and spilled over to the general H-1B pool.

The business immigration trends show that the total of 85,000 annual H-1B cap is simply not enough to meet the employers’ pressing need for highly skilled professionals in specialty occupations.

Last year, the top ten companies that were recipients of approved H-1B petitions were in the information technology, telecommunications, accounting, finance and higher education fields. Infosys Technologies, an Indian firm topped the list of recipients with 4,559 H-1B visas issued and eight other Indian tech firms landed in the top ten.

Two U.S. companies, Microsoft and Intel, got the fifth and tenth ranks, respectively. The top ten companies received a total of 12,875 H-1B visas last year. A total of 29,074 companies received H-1B approvals for their employees.