Site icon News Bit

U.S. Will Waive In-Person Interviews for H-1B, Other Work Visas

WASHINGTON—The State Department is temporarily dropping an in-person interview requirement for some work-visa categories in 2022 to ease visa issuances, as the Covid-19 pandemic stretches into a third year, the department announced Thursday.

Applicants for H-1B, L-1 and O-1 visas applying from abroad won’t be required to do an in-person interview at a U.S. consulate, typically the final step before a visa is issued. Those categories represent the most common visa types companies use to attract high-skilled talent from abroad.

Student visas and visas for temporary, seasonal workers have already been exempted from in-person interviews, and the State Department said those categories would continue to be exempted through the end of 2022.

The in-person interview has been one hurdle in the way of consulates issuing visas to the U.S. at pre-pandemic levels. Many consulates are operating at reduced capacity because of the pandemic. Roughly 60% of U.S. consulates are still partially closed, meaning they aren’t processing most work-visa types, according to a Cato Institute analysis of State Department data.

In a typical year, the U.S. would issue more than 100,000 visas in these categories, according to a review of State department data in 2019. But because of the consulate closures, lines to immigrate have been growing longer, and the issuance of work visas at some consulates, including in India, have come to a standstill. Consulates that have reduced their operations generally give priority to processing permanent immigrants to the U.S. rather than temporary visa holders.

The logjam is one reason businesses cite to explain a continuing labor shortage in the U.S.

Jon Baselice,

vice president of immigration policy at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, welcomed the announcement.

“The critical factor going forward will be the extent to which consulates exercise these newly-granted authorities; the more the State Department uses them, the more beneficial they will be to American companies,” he said.

Interviews are expected to help the situation but not solve it entirely. As long as consulates continue to enforce social-distancing restrictions, they will likely continue to issue fewer visas.

Write to Michelle Hackman at michelle.hackman+1@wsj.com

Copyright ©2021 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8

For all the latest Business News Click Here 

 For the latest news and updates, follow us on Google News

Read original article here

Denial of responsibility! NewsBit.us is an automatic aggregator around the global media. All the content are available free on Internet. We have just arranged it in one platform for educational purpose only. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, all materials to their authors. If you are the owner of the content and do not want us to publish your materials on our website, please contact us by email – abuse@newsbit.us. The content will be deleted within 24 hours.
Exit mobile version