HYDERABAD: The federal authorities plan to significantly increase fees for H-1B visa renewal applications by extending a $4,000 charge to all renewals from companies with large numbers of H-1B employees. The H-1B visa, designed for foreign workers with specialized skills, is widely used by Silicon Valley tech firms but has been controversial due to questionable practices.
The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issued a proposal on June 6 to apply the fee to renewals involving a change in job title or significant changes in duties. This adjustment will affect companies with at least 50 employees, of which more than half are on H-1B or L-1 visas, the latter being for executives and managers.
Currently, the fee applies only to new H-1B applications and renewals involving a change of employer. According to the DHS, the proposed fee change, published in the federal register, would generate approximately $157 million annually. The $4,000 biometric fee, in place since 2015, funds a system using facial imagery to track non-Americans entering and exiting the US DHS claims the increase is essential to maintaining and implementing biometric entry and exit programs.
The new fee is estimated to impact around 22,000 renewal applications annually, affecting a range of industries, including software publishing, data processing, computer-systems design, and engineering.
Public comments on the proposal are being accepted until July 8, prior to finalization. Companies apply for the H-1B through a lottery system that awards a maximum of 85,000 new visas each year. In 2019, nearly 60,000 H-1B holders were approved to work in the Bay area, according to the Bay area council.
Earlier this year, US citizenship and immigration services raised fees for preliminary H-1B applications from $10 to $250, starting next year, and increased the fee for applications selected in the lottery from $460 to $780.
