Sponsoring an employee?

[mroels]

Hi,

I own a economic/pipe investment research firm and recently interviewed a very promising candidate who is currently on his OPT (i guess thats what its called). He brought up the fact that he will need to be sponsored by my firm should i chose to hire him. So my question is what does sponsorship mean for my firm in terms of liability and responsibility. And also what are the procedures and fees associate with sponsorship. Any info will be greatly appreciated.

 

[wong561hb]

a few months prior to his OPT expiring, you would need to apply for an H1 visa on his behalf (work visa for foreigners), your org. being the sponsoring firm. It is generally recommend this be done using an Immigration Attorney, although this is not required. I believe fees for an H-1 are in the 1000-1500 USD range depending on the attorney.

 

[hadron]

Depending on how long you intend to employ this candidate, you might want to directly sponsor him for permanent residency (green-card). Depending on what country he is from, this might actually be the better option rather than gambling on obtaining one of the 58.000 H1b visas.

 

[annoosa]

if the employee is willing to pay all expences u sould not have any prob or liability..

 

[hadron]

With OPT the prospective employee has 1 year of time to get a green-card or to file for AOS.

With PERM and many I140s being processed in a 6 month timeframe, it CAN be a reasonable choice to go that route (if the employee is not from a backlogged country of course).
If the employee is from a country where waiting times for immigrant visa interviews are short, he could even manage to get his entire process through in a year.

If the OP is truly interested in this candidate, his best bet is probably to hire a good immigration attorney to look at the options.