Sophie Alcorn, lawyer, writer and founding father of Alcorn Immigration Law in Silicon Valley, California, is an award-winning Licensed Specialist Lawyer in Immigration and Nationality Legislation by the State Bar Board of Authorized Specialization. Sophie is obsessed with transcending borders, increasing alternative, and connecting the world by working towards compassionate, visionary, and skilled immigration legislation. Connect with Sophie on LinkedIn and Twitter.
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Pricey Sophie,
I’m working within the U.S. on an H-1B visa, which I obtained in 2022. Nonetheless, I don’t have an H-1B visa stamp in my passport as a result of I modified my standing from an F-1 pupil to H-1B skilled whereas within the U.S. Though I feel I qualify for an interview waiver on the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi, I haven’t left the U.S. due to the uncertainty of whether or not I’d be granted an interview waiver and the potential delay in returning to my job within the U.S. I heard a brand new visa stamping program will begin within the U.S. quickly. Do I qualify?
— Looking for Stamp
Pricey Looking for,
Remaining within the U.S. after getting approval in your H-1B specialty occupation visa was the prudent factor to do! We have now many consumers who, such as you, modified their standing whereas within the U.S. and don’t have a visa foil — typically known as a visa stamp — of their passport. Since COVID, we’ve typically suggested people to keep away from worldwide journey until completely vital. This has been because of a mix of fixing elements corresponding to unpredictable visa appointment wait occasions and the discretionary waiver course of for in-person interviews, which has been prolonged not less than to the tip of this yr.
So, thanks in your query in regards to the home visa stamping pilot program that the U.S. Division of State (DoS), which oversees consular processing for visas and inexperienced playing cards, introduced final month in a notice revealed within the Federal Register.
The pilot program has been considerably scaled again from final yr’s preliminary stories to restrict the required sources. On the time, stories indicated that the pilot program would allow each H-1B and L-1 visa holders to renew the visa stamp of their passport whereas remaining within the U.S. In different phrases, they may get a visa stamp with out having to journey again to their dwelling nation and anticipate an appointment at a U.S. embassy or consulate.
The pilot program’s objective
The State Division beforehand supplied stateside visa stamping for a lot of nonimmigrant visa renewals, together with E, H, L, and O visas, till October 26, 2004, when the Enhanced Border Safety and Visa Entry Reform Act of 2002, which was handed within the wake of the September 11 assaults, required the gathering of biometric information from visa candidates. Since then, the DoS has required all visa candidates, aside from sure diplomatic and different candidates, to get a visa stamp of their passport at a U.S. embassy or consulate overseas.
“The goal of this pilot,” based on the DoS discover, “is to test the Department’s technical and operational ability to resume domestic visa renewals for specific nonimmigrant classifications and to assess the efficacy of this program in reducing worldwide visa wait times by shifting certain workloads from overseas posts to the United States.”
