A few important questions regarding NIW

[indiandude1]

This forum ate my post because it logged me out while I was typing it in. Please fix it. Reposting (typed it offline first now).

I am in the final stages of preparing my EB2-NIW petition. I plan on doing this on my own (don't have a lawyer right now - might get one later). Over the last 6 months, I have studied this extensively and even purchased one DIY kit. Don't know if that is enough, but I am confident that I know quite a bit now.

I plan on filing my I-140 and I-485 concurrently. I understand that the answer to some of the questions below may change if I choose to file for I-140 alone. (Can I, from a retrogressed country, India, file for I-485 after the 2002 decision ?). Please indicate if you think that your answer is I-485 dependent.

First a bit about me. I have been in the U. S. for 10+ years. 5.5 years on F-1 / F-1 OPT (have an employment authorization card from that time that was used in some of my H-1B renewals / portability transfers). Close to 5 years on H-1B. I am anxious to apply for my I-140 before my sixth year starts so that I can use the 7th year H-1B extension if need be.

My first H-1B status was granted in April 2005. In Jan 2007 I used portability to transfer to a second (my current) employer. So, since then, my renewals have borne Jan as the date. My employer is in the process of preparing a request for extension of my status right now. In light of all this, when are my six years up - Apr, 2011 or Jan, 2011 ?

Now, let me pose some I-140 / green card process specific questions. I thank you guys for your wisdom and willingness to share your knowledge in advance

1. Do all documents (copies of degrees, etc.) need to be notarized ?

2. I have been reading around and came across the following requirements on bestchineshelp website (can't post the URL because I have not yet made 15 posts):

a. I-94 forms. Do I need the latest, or all of them ? (I made copies of some of the older ones when I went on trips).
b. H-1B approval notices. Same question as a. Do I need to include my old I-20 notices as well ?
c. Social security card. Do I need to submit the original card ?
d. Photocopies of birth certificates. My original birth certificate is in Hindi. Where do I get a translation ? Can I use my Indian matriculation certificate instead for proof of that ? I do not remember, but I think that the date of birth might have been on one or more of my visa stamps. It is on my passport anyways.
e. No criminal conviction certificates. I have no criminal record (U. S. or India). How does one prove a negative ?
f. Paychecks last two months and W2 forms. I have one 1099-S, 8 (and soon to be 9) W2 forms. How many do I need to attach ?

3. I have read somewhere that one needs to attach copies of tax returns as well. Is that true ? If so, how many ? Does this then trigger an audit from IRS ?

4. I have read in at least one other place that one needs to attach CVs of recommenders as well. Is that true ? My recommendation letters all have a decent sized paragraph (5-15 lines) of an introduction by the recommender about himself. Is that enough ?

5. I have found references to experience letters (the term is not very clearly defined, but I understand that these are used to prove that you have the experience you are claiming. My 8 recommendation letters include 3 from current and former bosses. These mention the dates of my employment / study with them. Is that sufficient ?

6. I will likely be changing employers in 6 months from now. So, my address will change. This has been mentioned in some of my recommendation letters and the cover letter I am writing (partially to argue that labor certification process will be detrimental to U. S. national interest). How does this impact my petition, and how do I communicate that change in address to USCIS ?

7. I will not be able to provide the new H-1B approval notice for my upcoming sixth year as the process is underway (and that will take a couple of months). If I file my petition before the end of my fifth year (as I plan to), will this fact generate an automatic RFE during the process ?

8. There is a decent chance that I might be getting married to a U. S. citizen before the end of next year. For self-respect reasons, I want to go through the NIW route (yes, it is important to me). How will that affect my petition ?

 

[Kariboo]

My first H-1B status was granted in April 2005. In Jan 2007 I used portability to transfer to a second (my current) employer. So, since then, my renewals have borne Jan as the date. My employer is in the process of preparing a request for extension of my status right now. In light of all this, when are my six years up - Apr, 2011 or Jan, 2011 ?

In April 2011


1. Do all documents (copies of degrees, etc.) need to be notarized ?
No

2. I have been reading around and came across the following requirements on bestchineshelp website (can't post the URL because I have not yet made 15 posts):

a. I-94 forms. Do I need the latest, or all of them ? (I made copies of some of the older ones when I went on trips).

The last one

b. H-1B approval notices. Same question as a. Do I need to include my old I-20 notices as well ?

You need to include all the notices

c. Social security card. Do I need to submit the original card ?

No, never

d. Photocopies of birth certificates. My original birth certificate is in Hindi. Where do I get a translation ?

You can contact a translation agency, you can contact your country of origin to ask if they give out copies in English, there are some things that you are allowed to have translated by someone who is proficient in Hindi and English (not an official translator). I am not sure if this is allowed for birth certificates.

Can I use my Indian matriculation certificate instead for proof of that ? I do not remember, but I think that the date of birth might have been on one or more of my visa stamps. It is on my passport anyways.

They are not valid as birthcertificates

e. No criminal conviction certificates. I have no criminal record (U. S. or India). How does one prove a negative ?

We didn't have to do this for NIW

f. Paychecks last two months and W2 forms. I have one 1099-S, 8 (and soon to be 9) W2 forms. How many do I need to attach ?

We attached the last 6 months paychecks, I believe the last 2 or 3 are adequate

3. I have read somewhere that one needs to attach copies of tax returns as well. Is that true ? If so, how many ? Does this then trigger an audit from IRS ?

You do if you have to file form I 864 they are for the last 3 years.

4. I have read in at least one other place that one needs to attach CVs of recommenders as well. Is that true ? My recommendation letters all have a decent sized paragraph (5-15 lines) of an introduction by the recommender about himself. Is that enough ?

Yes they have to include their CV's

5. I have found references to experience letters (the term is not very clearly defined, but I understand that these are used to prove that you have the experience you are claiming. My 8 recommendation letters include 3 from current and former bosses. These mention the dates of my employment / study with them. Is that sufficient ?

Not if you are using them as your recommendation letters, they need to specifically state why it is in the national interest to keep you here and explain how and why you are important in your line of work.

6. I will likely be changing employers in 6 months from now. So, my address will change. This has been mentioned in some of my recommendation letters and the cover letter I am writing (partially to argue that labor certification process will be detrimental to U. S. national interest). How does this impact my petition, and how do I communicate that change in address to USCIS ?

7. I will not be able to provide the new H-1B approval notice for my upcoming sixth year as the process is underway (and that will take a couple of months). If I file my petition before the end of my fifth year (as I plan to), will this fact generate an automatic RFE during the process ?

8. There is a decent chance that I might be getting married to a U. S. citizen before the end of next year. For self-respect reasons, I want to go through the NIW route (yes, it is important to me). How will that affect my petition ?

 

[indiandude1]

Thanks for your response !

My first H-1B status was granted in April 2005. In Jan 2007 I used portability to transfer to a second (my current) employer. So, since then, my renewals have borne Jan as the date. My employer is in the process of preparing a request for extension of my status right now. In light of all this, when are my six years up - Apr, 2011 or Jan, 2011 ?

In April 2011

So what document should I use for the period Jan 2011 to Apr 2011 (if I need to) ? My new H-1B approval form will be valid only until Jan 2011. Do I need to apply for a 3 month extension then ?

1. Do all documents (copies of degrees, etc.) need to be notarized ?
No

Is there a specific subset of documents that need to be notarized ?

b. H-1B approval notices. Same question as a. Do I need to include my old I-20 notices as well ?

You need to include all the notices

Can I use these for establishing dates of relevant experience ? The reason I ask is that I am not very clear about experience letters.

d. Photocopies of birth certificates. My original birth certificate is in Hindi. Where do I get a translation ?

You can contact a translation agency, you can contact your country of origin to ask if they give out copies in English, there are some things that you are allowed to have translated by someone who is proficient in Hindi and English (not an official translator). I am not sure if this is allowed for birth certificates.

Can I use my Indian matriculation certificate instead for proof of that ? I do not remember, but I think that the date of birth might have been on one or more of my visa stamps. It is on my passport anyways.

They are not valid as birthcertificates

Thanks for clearing that up. I just took a look at the scan of my birth certificate. By sheer luck, it so happens that my late father applied for this birth certificate about 12 years after I was born, and the issuing clerk made a handwritten annotation in English on the certificate reproducing the gist of the document, right on top of the non-English text !

3. I have read somewhere that one needs to attach copies of tax returns as well. Is that true ? If so, how many ? Does this then trigger an audit from IRS ?

You do if you have to file form I 864 they are for the last 3 years.

Do NIW cases need I-864 ? From a cursory reading of the form, its needed to establish that I will not become a burden on the US taxpayer. I am self-filing my petition (like all NIWs). The issue is that my current job offer letter is valid only until end June, 2010. I have applied for jobs for after that and am in the middle of my job search.

I thought that NIW meant that I did not need to go through an employer or have a long term job offer in hand at the time of the application.

Or should I defer filing my I-485 for another six months by which time I will hopefully have a tenure-track position in hand (however, wouldn't I then need to wait for the green card backlog for India to get cleared) ?

Or should I just file my 485 as it is (without the 864), and start preparing right away for the RFE it will generate (with the hope that this RFE will not be triggered until after my I-140 is hopefully approved - a process which I am told takes 6-8 months on an average) ?

I guess I am really confused about whether an 864 is even needed for an EB2-NIW (shouldn't by definition).

4. I have read in at least one other place that one needs to attach CVs of recommenders as well. Is that true ? My recommendation letters all have a decent sized paragraph (5-15 lines) of an introduction by the recommender about himself. Is that enough ?

Yes they have to include their CV's

Would a printout of a biosketch from their webpages (some have CVs there, but not all) do ? Some of these are really busy people and it was an imposition on their time to get the recommendation letters. As I mentioned earlier, a brief biosketch is included in all the recommendation letters. However, if there is anything that living in India and the U. S. has taught me, it is that you do not question rules, no matter how illogical they seem to be.

5. I have found references to experience letters (the term is not very clearly defined, but I understand that these are used to prove that you have the experience you are claiming. My 8 recommendation letters include 3 from current and former bosses. These mention the dates of my employment / study with them. Is that sufficient ?

Not if you are using them as your recommendation letters, they need to specifically state why it is in the national interest to keep you here and explain how and why you are important in your line of work.

They are doing all that (the recommendation letters are about 3-4 pages long full of glowing remarks about me, (in these 3 cases) details of the projects I worked on, my contributions, sources of funding, and how those projects positively impact U. S. national economy and security, with a closing argument about how national interest would be harmed by requiring me to go through the labor certification process in light of my skills and potential, etc.). Its just that they also mention the dates when I worked for them in those letters. Do I need to ask them for a short additional letter confirming that yet again ? Seems kinda strange (ok, make that very strange), but I am not going to argue with rules.

6. I will likely be changing employers in 6 months from now. So, my address will change. This has been mentioned in some of my recommendation letters and the cover letter I am writing (partially to argue that labor certification process will be detrimental to U. S. national interest). How does this impact my petition, and how do I communicate that change in address to USCIS ?

7. I will not be able to provide the new H-1B approval notice for my upcoming sixth year as the process is underway (and that will take a couple of months). If I file my petition before the end of my fifth year (as I plan to), will this fact generate an automatic RFE during the process ?

8. There is a decent chance that I might be getting married to a U. S. citizen before the end of next year. For self-respect reasons, I want to go through the NIW route (yes, it is important to me). How will that affect my petition ?

Thanks a lot for your help and insight. Maybe someone else can chip in for the three remaining questions.

 

[alex09]

I didn't attach any CV of recommenders. My lawyer said it was not necessary and the USCIS officier would not have time to review them.

Regarding question 6, changing employer and/or address has no impact on your petition. However, you need to inform the USCIS so that they will send the correspondents to the new address.

 

[Kariboo]

Indiandude, the things I can tell you is how we did it for our NIW application (through an attorney and the advice he gave us). I don't know if the way we did it is absolutely necessary or the only way to do things so don't take my advice as a substitute for legal advice. What I can tell you is that we applied for NIW (without a employer as sponsor). The paperwork arrived at USCIS on Oct 27 and we had our greencard in hand on Dec 15. So something worked out well

Thanks for your response !


So what document should I use for the period Jan 2011 to Apr 2011 (if I need to) ? My new H-1B approval form will be valid only until Jan 2011. Do I need to apply for a 3 month extension then ?

You need to give them the copies to show that you have not been out of status so far, you can only give them what you have until now. The reason your H1B period expires in April 2011 is because you start counting you max of 6 years from April 2005. Unless you file after Jan 2011 there should not be an issue

Is there a specific subset of documents that need to be notarized ?

not that I know of, we had nothing notarized

Can I use these for establishing dates of relevant experience ? The reason I ask is that I am not very clear about experience letters.
I am not sure what these experience letters are, we have used only recommendation letters. What you do need to check is that people don't refer to you working at place A when your HIB says you are working at place B at that time. Copies of your visa are used to proof that you are here legitimately, in your reference letters people describe the work you have done and how that is relevant to the US.



Do NIW cases need I-864 ? From a cursory reading of the form, its needed to establish that I will not become a burden on the US taxpayer. I am self-filing my petition (like all NIWs). The issue is that my current job offer letter is valid only until end June, 2010. I have applied for jobs for after that and am in the middle of my job search.I thought that NIW meant that I did not need to go through an employer or have a long term job offer in hand at the time of the application.

We had to file a I 864 so at least in some cases it is necessary. I can;t tell you if you have to because it mentions different categories of people who do or do not need to fill it out. The reason for the form is to show that you "have enough income and/or assets to maintain the intending immigrant(s) and the rest of your household at 125 percent of the Federal Poverty Guidelines".

Or should I defer filing my I-485 for another six months by which time I will hopefully have a tenure-track position in hand (however, wouldn't I then need to wait for the green card backlog for India to get cleared) ?

I don't know, we are not from a retrogressed country so we filed concurrently

Or should I just file my 485 as it is (without the 864), and start preparing right away for the RFE it will generate (with the hope that this RFE will not be triggered until after my I-140 is hopefully approved - a process which I am told takes 6-8 months on an average) ?

I guess I am really confused about whether an 864 is even needed for an EB2-NIW (shouldn't by definition).

I can't tell you for sure, however there should not be a differnece in you preparing that now as opposed to month in the future, since it askes for your past income and your current assets (assuming you make less that the federal poverty guidelines)

Would a printout of a biosketch from their webpages (some have CVs there, but not all) do ? Some of these are really busy people and it was an imposition on their time to get the recommendation letters. As I mentioned earlier, a brief biosketch is included in all the recommendation letters. However, if there is anything that living in India and the U. S. has taught me, it is that you do not question rules, no matter how illogical they seem to be.

I see that Alex09 attorney told him it was not necessary, ours said it was, so I don't know what is true. I think it is better to give them all they ask for and not risk a RFE for something as minor as this. If your referees have already written your recommendation letters you can let them know that USCIS needs a fairly recent CV as well. In my experience 99.9% of scientist have these readily available so it would just be a quick email for them as it was in our case. The big hurdle is the letter itself

They are doing all that (the recommendation letters are about 3-4 pages long full of glowing remarks about me, (in these 3 cases) details of the projects I worked on, my contributions, sources of funding, and how those projects positively impact U. S. national economy and security, with a closing argument about how national interest would be harmed by requiring me to go through the labor certification process in light of my skills and potential, etc.). Its just that they also mention the dates when I worked for them in those letters. Do I need to ask them for a short additional letter confirming that yet again ? Seems kinda strange (ok, make that very strange), but I am not going to argue with rules.

I don't think you need that, we didn't

Thanks a lot for your help and insight. Maybe someone else can chip in for the three remaining questions.

 

[indiandude1]

Indiandude, the things I can tell you is how we did it for our NIW application (through an attorney and the advice he gave us). I don't know if the way we did it is absolutely necessary or the only way to do things so don't take my advice as a substitute for legal advice. What I can tell you is that we applied for NIW (without a employer as sponsor). The paperwork arrived at USCIS on Oct 27 and we had our greencard in hand on Dec 15. So something worked out well

Cool

Can you tell me how long your cover letter was ? The arguments and content obviously vary from person to person, but I would like to have an idea of the ideal length.

One more question - is it a good idea to include images in the cover letter if it increases the understanding of the USCIS officer about the importance of your work ?

Regarding the I-864, I guess I will need to do more digging. I am single and gainfully employed (so I do not see why I would need it), with an income well above the poverty level. Other than my car, I do not have any major assets. I do have some credit card debt (my previous car was totalled by some idiot in the parking lot and I had no option but to put the remainder of the loan on a zero percent credit card). My credit score is excellent, and I always make more than the minimum payment.

Further reading of the I-485 rules has only confirmed what I had suspected. I cannot file concurrently since I am from India, a retrogressed country. I guess I will have to depend on extension of my H-1B past the sixth year since I am filing my I-140 petition before my last year on H-1B starts.

 

[Kariboo]

Can you tell me how long your cover letter was ? The arguments and content obviously vary from person to person, but I would like to have an idea of the ideal length.

According to our attorney the ideal length is about 10 pages, to prevent the person reading it to fall asleep, however the letter we drafted for my husband was about 16 pages. After having the attorney read it he decided that it was so well written that he didn't want to shorten it.

The important part is to persuasively argue your case using the NIW criteria. In your cover letter you can quote parts of the reference letters - as is I made an economic difference with invention A , also remarked by referee 1 who is an expert in the field bla bla. -

One more question - is it a good idea to include images in the cover letter if it increases the understanding of the USCIS officer about the importance of your work ?
I don't know, it depends on how easy the image is to understand as opposed to you writing it out. The tone of the letter has to be easily understood by anyone (so I would suggest you have someone who is not a scientist read it and see if they understand it), but you also cannot diminish the work you are doing (by making it sound too easy or leaving out the important parts) It's a balancing act.

Regarding the I-864, I guess I will need to do more digging. I am single and gainfully employed (so I do not see why I would need it),I don't know about your situation in particular. The way I read it is that it is to prove that the immigrant (you) can support himself but I could be wrong. with an income well above the poverty level. If that is the case filling it out will be easy as you don't have to give more evidence than that, you do have to include last 3 tax returns Other than my car, I do not have any major assets. I do have some credit card debt (my previous car was totalled by some idiot in the parking lot and I had no option but to put the remainder of the loan on a zero percent credit card). My credit score is excellent, and I always make more than the minimum payment. None of this is important if you make more than 125% of federal poverty guidelines

Further reading of the I-485 rules has only confirmed what I had suspected. I cannot file concurrently since I am from India, a retrogressed country. I guess I will have to depend on extension of my H-1B past the sixth year since I am filing my I-140 petition before my last year on H-1B starts.
Depending on how strong your case is you could also file for EB1A, I think it is worthwhile to contact a good attorney about this and see what his opinion is. I know that an attorney is expensive but it is really nice to be able to ask him these questions and get an answer from someone who does this for a living. To us he has been invaluable and was obviously able to get us through this thing in a couple of weeks with no RFE's

 

[indiandude1]

Can you tell me how long your cover letter was ? The arguments and content obviously vary from person to person, but I would like to have an idea of the ideal length.

According to our attorney the ideal length is about 10 pages, to prevent the person reading it to fall asleep, however the letter we drafted for my husband was about 16 pages. After having the attorney read it he decided that it was so well written that he didn't want to shorten it.

Ok. 10-12 pages then. I already have 8-9 written up. I guess I need to do some redrafting.

The important part is to persuasively argue your case using the NIW criteria. In your cover letter you can quote parts of the reference letters - as is I made an economic difference with invention A , also remarked by referee 1 who is an expert in the field bla bla. -

My work has a bigger weight in basic sciences so its more a matter of potential than already achieved economic difference. My reference letters include plenty of such words.

Regarding the I-864, I guess I will need to do more digging. I am single and gainfully employed (so I do not see why I would need it),I don't know about your situation in particular. The way I read it is that it is to prove that the immigrant (you) can support himself but I could be wrong. with an income well above the poverty level. If that is the case filling it out will be easy as you don't have to give more evidence than that, you do have to include last 3 tax returns Other than my car, I do not have any major assets. I do have some credit card debt (my previous car was totalled by some idiot in the parking lot and I had no option but to put the remainder of the loan on a zero percent credit card). My credit score is excellent, and I always make more than the minimum payment. None of this is important if you make more than 125% of federal poverty guidelines

Ok. The tax return requirement is a little weird because they are already asking for a W2 (which should be enough to establish income level). But I will send both in.

Further reading of the I-485 rules has only confirmed what I had suspected. I cannot file concurrently since I am from India, a retrogressed country. I guess I will have to depend on extension of my H-1B past the sixth year since I am filing my I-140 petition before my last year on H-1B starts.
Depending on how strong your case is you could also file for EB1A, I think it is worthwhile to contact a good attorney about this and see what his opinion is. I know that an attorney is expensive but it is really nice to be able to ask him these questions and get an answer from someone who does this for a living. To us he has been invaluable and was obviously able to get us through this thing in a couple of weeks with no RFE's

I might go for an attorney at some stage. If I am not mistaken, wouldn't retrogression be a concern even for EB-1A in theory (though that is not the case currently for India) ?

I think my case for EB-1A is not very strong. Further, getting a second set of recommendation letters from some of the people I got the first set from is going to be difficult. It has just taken me six months to get all my letters in. The earliest one is dated July, 2009. The last one is going to be dated Jan, 2010.