Brick, NJ Immigration Law Firms & Lawyers

Unknown factors in your question make it difficult to give good advice. Where were you born? What is the nature of your brother's company? What is the setup of his company? Is it profitable? What other options might you have? I suggest that you make an appointment with an immigration lawyer who can go over all of your circumstances. Insofar as your question of whether you can change status from B-1 to H-1B directly, you would likely not be able to do so with your brother's company because of timing issues, but might be able to do it with a cap exempt organization such as an institution of higher education, an organization affiliated with an institution of higher education, a government research Institute, or a nonprofit research institute. Companies like your brother's are subject to the annual cap on H-1B visas, and can only file H-1B visa petitions during the first five business days of each April. Due to the limitations of the Lawyers.com Forums, Alan Lee, Esq.'s (the "Firm") participation in responding to questions posted herein does not constitute legal advice, nor legal representation of the person or entity posting a question. No Attorney/Client relationship is or shall be construed to be created hereby. The information provided herein by the Firm is general, and requires that the poster obtain specific legal advice from an attorney. The poster shall not rely upon the information provided herein as legal advice nor as the basis for making any decisions of legal consequence.  

Currently in the month of July, immigrant visa availability is only open to those who filed I-130 petitions under the F-4 category for siblings of US citizens before February 8, 2007, except for natives of India, Mexico, and the Philippines who face longer wait times. So currently for your brother, the waiting time looks like approximately 14 years. If your brother has other ways to immigrate, he should explore those options. Your petition for him should be used as a backup only. Due to the limitations of the Lawyers.com Forums, Alan Lee & Arthur Lee, Esqs.’ (the "Firm") participation in responding to questions posted herein does not constitute legal advice, nor legal representation of the person or entity posting a question. No Attorney/Client relationship is or shall be construed to be created hereby. The information provided herein by the Firm is general, and requires that the poster obtain specific legal advice from an attorney. The poster shall not rely upon the information provided herein as legal advice nor as the basis for making any decisions of legal consequence.  

The difficulty here is that you have already switched over your employment to your 2nd employer without having the new H-1B petition approved. That is allowed under the law, but the complication arises when the petition is not approved. Then when you attempt to have your 3rd employer petition for a new H-1B transfer, U.S.C.I.S. will usually request recent payslips from the company with the approved H-1B petition. If you were still with the original H-1B employer, you would have no problem in providing the payslips. Then there would be no consequences to the 2nd H-1B petition not being approved. But where you have already jumped to the 2nd employer, U.S.C.I.S. might also take a look and see whether the 2nd employer H-1B petition is actually approvable before granting the extension on the 3rd company H-1B petition. The upshot is that if U.S.C.I.S. decides that the 2nd petition is not approvable, that it may believe that you have not maintained legal status. It may then approve the petition but deny the extension in the States and request you to consular process the approved petition.  In answer to your other question, there is no recognized grace period for H-1Bs where there is a denial. Due to the limitations of the Lawyers.com Forums, Alan Lee, Esq.'s (the "Firm") participation in responding to questions posted herein does not constitute legal advice, nor legal representation of the person or entity posting a question. No Attorney/Client relationship is or shall be construed to be created hereby. The information provided herein by the Firm is general, and requires that the poster obtain specific legal advice from an attorney. The poster shall not rely upon the information provided herein as legal advice nor as the basis for making any decisions of legal consequence.