Employers and their immigration counsel have made it through the rush of the FY 2015 H-1B cap filing season. As anticipated, the season was again highly competitive. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) received a record 172,500 petitions this year for H-1B employment in FY 2015, against the annual H-1B cap of 85,000—more than double the petitions needed to meet the quota.1 This means that more than half the H-1B petitions were rejected in USCIS’s cap selection lottery, leaving many employers unable to meet hiring needs or retain talented foreign professionals.
Employers fortunate enough to have a case accepted for filing face tougher government scrutiny and greater likelihood of denial. This article will address what petitioning employers can expect as their H-1B cases are adjudicated and will also provide a snapshot of possible options for U.S. employers whose H-1B petitions were not selected in this year’s cap.
