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L-1A Visa Lawyers

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What is the L-1A visa program?

The L-1A visa classification allows an exchange between the United States and foreign businesses. Under the program, U.S. employers are allowed to transfer a foreign national executive or manager to the U.S. to work. As such, the L-1A visa classification provides beneficiaries with non-immigrant, temporary visas.

Who qualifies for the L-1A Intracompany Transferee Executive or Manager program?

The L-1 is a “dual intent” classification: an L-1 worker may seek permanent residence while in L-1 status, as long as they intend to depart at the end of their authorized stay (8 CFR 214.2(l)(16)). It is designed to allow those in leadership positions to establish or further their company’s business interests across international borders. The L-1A visa requires certain levels of qualifications, and only employees who serve in executive or managerial capacities can receive a visa under this classification.
  • Executive capacity: The employee primarily directs the management of the organization or a major component or function, establishes its goals and policies, exercises wide latitude in discretionary decision-making, and receives only general supervision from higher-level executives, the board, or stockholders.
  • Managerial capacity: The employee primarily manages the organization or a department, function, or component; supervises and controls the work of other supervisory, professional, or managerial employees (or manages an essential function); has authority to hire and fire or recommend personnel actions (or, if no one is directly supervised, works at a senior level); and exercises discretion over day-to-day operations. A first-line supervisor generally does not qualify unless the employees supervised are professionals.
In addition to serving in an executive or managerial role, the employee must have at least one continuous year of full-time employment abroad with a qualifying organization (the same employer or its parent, branch, subsidiary, or affiliate) within the three years before the petition is filed.

L-1B Visas for Specialized Knowledge Employees

L-1B is a separate intracompany transfer category for employees who are not coming as managers or executives but who have specialized knowledge. It allows a U.S. employer to transfer an employee from a related foreign company (a parent, branch, subsidiary or affiliate) to its U.S. office. It can also allow a foreign company to send a specialized knowledge employee to help establish a new U.S. office.

“Specialized knowledge” means special knowledge of the company’s product, service, research, equipment, techniques, management or other interests and their application in international markets, or an advanced level of knowledge or expertise in the organization’s processes and procedures. As with L-1A, the employee generally must have worked for the qualifying organization abroad for one continuous year within the three years before admission, and the U.S. employer files Form I-129. If the employer has an approved blanket L petition, the employee may instead apply at a U.S. consulate using Form I-129S; blanket L-1B is limited to specialized knowledge professionals.

L-1B has a shorter maximum stay than L-1A: generally an initial stay of up to three years (one year for a new office), with extensions in increments of up to two years, to a maximum of five years. Spouses in valid L-2S status are employment authorized incident to status. Whether a role qualifies as specialized knowledge depends heavily on the facts and the documentation, so it is worth having an attorney review the position before filing.

L-1A Visa

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More About L-1A Visas

To petition for L-1A beneficiaries, employers must be able to show a qualifying relationship between the U.S-based employer and the employee’s foreign employer. This means that both of these employers must be either the same organization, such as a U.S. company with a foreign office, or related organizations, such as a “parent and subsidiary” or affiliate organizations.

The definition of a subsidiary is complicated under the statute, but it all comes down to the relationship between ownership and control. Affiliated organizations must be “bound to one another by substantial, but not necessarily majority, ownership of shares”. And in addition to ownership, considerations of management and control are also important.

Foreign employers who intend to send an employee to the U.S. to open a new office must demonstrate that:

  • The organization has secured sufficient physical premises to house a new office;
  • The employee has been employed as an executive or manager for one continuous year in the three years preceding the filing of the L-1A petition; and 
  • The U.S. office will be in a position to support an executive or managerial position within one year of the approval of the L-1A petition.

Ultimately, any organization with existing or planned multinational operations is likely to have a complicated business structure, which will need to be accounted for in the application process. This makes hiring a business immigration lawyer worth considering.

When a company decides to invest in the U.S. economy through its L-1A employees, the application process is straightforward Checklist for the employer include the following:
  • Employer files an I-129, Petition for a Nonimmigrant Worker.
  • USCIS sends an I-797 Notice of Action to the approved employer.
  • Employee completes the DS-160 electronically, submits photographs and fingerprints, and interviews with their U.S. embassy or consular office.
The most complicated part of the petition and the DS-160 is documentation. It is imperative for employers to answer all the relevant questions listed on the petition. Likewise, it is also important to review the employee’s application thoroughly and provide enough evidence to demonstrate that any needed criteria is met.

By law, Canadian citizens are exempt from certain L-1 visa requirements. Canadian citizens may instead present a completed Form I-129 and its supporting documentation to the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers at certain U.S ports of entry or even at a U.S. pre-flight inspection station in Canada to seek admission into the U.S. under the L-1 status.

There are no caps on L-1A visas, which means that companies can bring as many of their qualified employees to the U.S. as needed to accomplish their business goals. Between 2015 and 2019, the U.S. issued nearly 80,000 visas to L-1A beneficiaries.
  • Employees entering the United States to establish a new office will be allowed a maximum initial stay of one year.
  • Employees who have been transferred from a foreign office are allowed an initial stay of three years.
All L-1A beneficiaries may request extensions of their stays in increments of two years until the employee has reached the maximum limit of seven years.
Of the roughly 160 countries that transferred employees to the U.S. in 2019,the countries with the most intracompany transfers under the L-1A program were:
  • India;
  • The United Kingdom;
  • Brazil;
  • Mexico; and
  • China.
Tech companies lead the pack for L-1 visas, including Amazon, Google, IBM, and Apple. Because the L-1A program is intended to encourage investment in the U.S., some believe that capping the program would prevent multinational companies from opening branches in the U.S. and encourage American companies to go offshore.
While multinational companies’ offices in the U.S. employ four times as many Americans as they do foreign nationals, the L-1 visa program remains a critical part of the global economy that allows for the exchange of ideas. The U.S. is poised to welcome greater investment in its industries, so Farmer Law today for your immigration needs

From L-1A to an EB-1C green card

Some L-1A managers and executives may later qualify for an EB-1C immigrant petition (INA 203(b)(1)(C)). Generally, the U.S. employer files Form I-140 and must show that: the employee worked abroad for at least one year in the three years before the petition (or before entering the U.S. as a nonimmigrant for the same employer) in a managerial or executive role for the same company or its affiliate or subsidiary; the U.S. employer is that same company or its affiliate or subsidiary and has been doing business for at least one year; and the U.S. job is managerial or executive. No labor certification is required. Each case depends on its facts.

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The attorneys at Farmer Law PC help businesses, employers and individuals with employment-based, investor and family-based immigration. For agricultural and seasonal employers, we handle H-2A and H-2B applications and help respond to DOL audits, Wage and Hour investigations and Notices of Deficiency.

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