Immigration news

The controversial fee increases for an H-1B visa (from $2,000 to $4,000) and the L-1 visa (from $2,250 to $4,500), have received widespread news coverage in recent weeks. Unsurprisingly, the visa fee increase has caused friction between India and the US.

Reports coming out of India suggest that Indian IT firms are likely to respond by increasing client fees and processing more work from their centres in India. This will soften the blow of increased costs due to fees being doubled for US H-1B and L-1 visas.

The UK, South-West Regional Director for CBI, Deborah Waddell, has described the Tier 2 visa and skilled immigration in general as crucial to the counties of Devon and Cornwall. The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) is one of the UK's leading independent employers' organisations, representing over 250,000 public and private sector companies.

Writing in the Exeter Express and Echo – a local newspaper for the South-West region of the UK - Ms Waddell said: "Access to talent and skills is an issue that unites businesses of all sizes, across all sectors."

As expected, the UK government has said it will not be re-introducing the Tier 1 Post-Study Work Visa, a decision that the Scottish government has described as 'deeply disappointing and damaging.' As previously reported by workpermit.com, the Scottish government has been trying to persuade Westminster to bring back the Tier 1 Post-Study Work Visa, which enabled international students on Tier 4 visas to remain in Scotland and work following graduation.

Friction between Australia's Federal Government and the country's tourism industry about the working holiday maker visa is due to a serious staff shortage currently affecting businesses. Business leaders in the tourism sector are demanding an immediate visa solution to ease the staffing crisis that's threatening to bring the industry to a standstill during its busiest time of year.

Thanks to the massive Omnibus spending bill signed by Obama on 18 December 2015 to avoid a possible "Government Shutdown" there is in effect an increase in the 66,000 H-2B visas available for fiscal year 2016. The H-2B non-agricultural non-immigrant visa program allows foreign nationals to enter the US to take up temporary non-agricultural jobs offered by employers where there is a proven shortage. From 18 January 2016 nationals of the following 16 Countries will be added to the program:

The much reported visa fee increases for both the H-1B visa (from $2,000 to $4,000) and the L-1 visa (from $2,250 to $4,500) have unsurprisingly caused some ripples between Indian and US official bodies. This visa fee increase applies to Companies that have more than 50 employees more than 50% of which are H-1B visa employees. This affects mainly Indian owned companies in the US.