Intracompany Transfer L1A Executives/Managers

Intracompany Transfer: L-1A Visas

This is a non-immigrant visa, allowing an employee to be transferred to the U.S. and work legally for the U.S. branch, subsidiary, affiliate or joint venture partner of the company. You must have been employed outside the U.S. as a manager, executive or person with specialized knowledge for at least one out of the past three years.

Big companies may apply for blanket L-1 visas. This enables the qualified company to transfer employees to the U.S. company frequently without filing for each individual employee.

We have a record of getting a L1A approved by CIS within 3 days of submission. Click here to see the approval letter

L1A 3 DAY APPROVAL LTR PDF_2009-03-09[1].pdf

We can evaluate if you are eligible to apply under this visa category, please contact us to arrange for an initial consultation.

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Privileges

· Once approved by the Citizenship and Immigration Service, spouse and children under age twenty-one may come to the U.S. with the transferred employee.

S Spouse may apply for work authorization to work legally in the U.S. for any employer.

CC Children may attend public school, no need to pay foreign student tuitions.

· You may travel in and out of the U.S. anytime

· If you have an L-1 visa for an executive or managerial level position in the U.S. company, the company may petition a green card for you and your family.

Restrictions

· You are restricted to working only for the U.S. company that sponsored your petition.

Visas can be issued for up to 3 years, extensions of 2 years at a time may be allowed until you have been in the U.S. for a total of seven years.

For purposes of this visa category, Citizenship and Immigration Services has specific requirements for those who are considered executive and managers, and persons with specialized skills.

L-1 visas are available only to employees of companies outside of the U.S. that have related U.S. braches, subsidiaries, affiliates or joint venture partners. For visa purposes, these terms have specific definitions.

Applications must include supporting documents to proof: length of employment abroad; position of employment abroad is of manager, executive or person with specialized knowledge; the U.S. and Non U.S. companies are engaged in trade or the rendering of services; a qualifying relationship exists between the U.S. and Non U.S. companies.

Requirements for L-1(trans-national company executives)

1. The parent company must be in operation and in good shape.

2. The US subsidiary or branch must be in operation.

3. The alien executive (manager) must have been working in the parent company for at least one year during the preceding three years before he/she entered the U.S.

4. The alien executive (manager or supervisor) must be in a managerial position or he/she must be a specialized personnel while he/she was working at the parent company.

L-1 visa is issued to employees transferred from a foreign company in a foreign country to its office in the United States. The key requirements are:

1. The foreign company is located outside the United States.

2. The foreign company has at least 50% ownership of the office in the United States.

3. The foreign company is still in normal business operation.

4. Those employees must be an executive, manager or a person with specialized knowledge.

5. They must have worked at the foreign company during the past three years.

6. They must have been working at least one year at the management level.

7. They work in the U.S. office at the same level as an executive, manager or a person with specialized knowledge.

8. There are other employees under their supervision.

To qualify as an "executive", the alien worker must:

1. Direct the management of the organization or a major component or function of the organization;

2. Establish the goals and policies of the organization, component or function;

3. Exercise wide latitude in discretionary decision-making;

4. Receive only general supervision from higher level executives, the board of directors, or stockholders of the organization.

To qualify as a "manager", the alien worker must:

1. Manage the organization, or a department, subdivision, function, or component of the organization.

2. Supervise and control the work of other supervisory, professional, or managerial employees, or manages an essential function within the organization, or a department or subdivision of the organization.

3. Have the authority to hire and fire supervised employees, or recommend them for promotion or other personnel action, or (if there are no immediate supervisees) function at a senior level within the organizational hierarchy; and

4. Exercise direction over the day to day operations of the activity or function over which the worker has authority.

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