Certain H1B and L-1 Filing Fees No Longer Required

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has announced that “… petitions filed on or after October 1, 2015, should not include the additional fee that was previously required by … Public Law 111-230 … for certain H1B and L-1 petitions.” This filing fee, which only applied to certain companies with large numbers of H1B and/or L-1 workers, ranged from $2,000 to $2,250 per petition. All other H1B and L-1 filing fees remain in effect.

Border Security Fee

President Barak Obama signed a border security law on August 13, 2010, which directed as much as $600 million towards protecting the nation’s borders. Much of this government funding was paid for through the creation on the aforementioned filing fee. This fee applied only to those companies with more than 50 employees in the United States, where at least 50 percent of the employees were in H1B or L-1 status. Companies that fell within these parameters were required to pay an additional $2,000 for each H1B petition, and $2,250 for each L-1 petition. The law that imposed this large fee fortunately included a “sunset” (i.e. expiration) date of September 30, 2015. Therefore, as of October 1st, this fee is no longer required.

Conclusion

The additional fees imposed under the border security law dramatically increased the cost of filing H1B and L-1 petitions for many petitioning employers. It is a relief to see that congress did not renew this onerous requirement.

 

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Disclaimer: The information provided here is of a general nature and may not apply to any specific or particular circumstance. It is not to be construed as legal advice nor presumed indefinitely up to date.