How to Apply for a New Employee H-1B

As human resources managers and executives, we handle a lot of paperwork and applications. But have you ever hired an employee who required an H-1B sponsorship?

If you’re an expansion stage company and you haven’t done it already, it’s likely that you will do so in the future as you add staff and management team members to your growing company.

So, how do you go about applying for an H-1B visa?

First, it’s important to know who qualifies as an H-1B applicant. According to H1Base.com, it’s the most popular and sought after US work visa. Every foreign national that hopes to work in the United States must obtain one in order to legally work in the country. The H-1B typically applies to highly-specialized workers (which certainly applies to many roles at expansion stage software companies) and provides a three to six year work permit window.

The visa program was originally designed to allow companies to tap into the global workforce to fill jobs that they could not otherwise fill with local candidates. Some companies have abused that requirement, forcing government regulation and various restructuring of the H-1B program.

Either way, there’s a lot involved with applying for an H-1B. But before doing anything else, as an employer sponsoring an H-1B applicant you must first complete an I-129 form. That will require the following information:

• Employer’s name, address, telephone number, and fax number.

• The year the company was established.

• The IRS tax identification number.

• The total number of employees. The government filing fee is lower for companies with fewer than 25 employees.

• The gross annual income for the previous year.

• The net annual income for the previous year.

• Whether full-time employees receive any type of compensation other than salary (i.e. health insurance or dental insurance). If so, you will need to detail what type of compensation is included and its value.

• The name and title of the person from your company who will be signing the Immigration and Naturalization Services petitions and that person’s address.

That information must then be submitted to the lawyer helping you apply for the new employee H-1B. That lawyer will also work directly with your future employee to obtain more information and documentation, including their passport, degree verification, employment contracts, and previous W-2s, if they exist.

It’s important to keep up with government immigration policy and how it may affect your ability to apply for an H-1B visa, too. In October, Congress was considering multiple bills that would reform the H-1B visa program. There are myriad issues with it, but one big problem is that the demand for H-1B visas can sometimes be much higher than the government’s allotted supply. Secondly, because some companies abuse the program, it’s caused over-regulation that can make hiring foreign talent more difficult than it should be, therefore encouraging some companies to move operations overseas.

PGP CEO Phil Dunkleberger wrote a particularly informative blog post about the H-1B program’s many glitches and why they needed to be fixed. As the CEO of an IT company, Dunkleberger’s perspective is especially relevant to expansion stage software companies.

Of course, as with most government reform, nothing is expected to change overnight. Your best bet is to simply stay up with current regulation and follow the steps laid out above.

You may feel somewhat rushed in the process because you’d like to get your new employee on board, but don’t hesitate to seek multiple quotes from lawyers specializing in H-1B visa applications. Lawyer fees can vary greatly and you’ll want to contract one that has experience handling the application process.

For all of the H-1B program’s drawbacks, it can allow you to recruit top level talent from around the globe and that’s often a key ingredient for many expansion stage software companies. If you follow protocol and prepare yourself with the necessary tools and information, you’ll be doing everything you can to improve your company’s staff and management team as it grows with the business.