FY-2023 H-1B Registration Season is Just Around the Corner

1. FY-2023 H-1B Registration Season is Just Around the Corner Although exact dates have not been announced, USCIS will begin accepting registrations for cap - subject H-1B visas the first week of March 2022. Again, this year employers must register each potential H-1B employee for the lottery electronically with a fee of $10 per employee. Then, USCIS will conduct a randomized lottery, choosing for the 20,000 Master’s degree cap petitions first, and the 65,000Bachelor’s degree cap petitions second, giving applicants with advanced degrees two shots at selection. Registrants selected in the lottery will then have 90 days to file a complete H-1B petition. For FY-2022 H-1B visas, over 308,000 electronic registrations were submitted. However, it took three rounds of H-1B lotteries to fill all H-1B visa slots. By the end of the selection process, 131,970 registrations were selected giving the opportunity to submit a completed petition. That means that beneficiaries not selected in the first lottery still have the opportunity to be selected to file. Employers have one month to identify potential H-1B employees and prepare to register for the lottery. That means getting started on the Labor Conditions Application and taking stock of current USCIS approval trends likely to impact their employees: Specialty Occupation Qualification – this H-1B requirement will likely impact employees working entry level jobs and/or making level one wages. Employees working at third-party worksites – employers must be able to show how they will be able to maintain the employer-employee relationship at third-party worksites, meaning the employer will continue to be able to control the work of the employee offsite. Education Issues – if the H-1B employee has anything but a US bachelor’s degree or higher in the exact field of the H-1B job a credential evaluation must be included to fill in any gaps between the education the employee has and that exact degree needed. This means taking course content, professional training, and progressive work experience into account.