Denial rates of H-1B nonimmigrant visas for Indian companies continued to remain high in the third quarter of fiscal 2020 as per a study of US Citizenship and Immigration (USCIS) data by the National Foundation for American Policy (NFAP).
Denial rates for new visas for services companies were higher than the average denial rate of 21% for the first three quarters of the fiscal, except for Tata Consultancy Services (15%).
Companies like Tech Mahindra, L&T and Infosys reported denial rates of 30%, 26% and 58% respectively, along with companies like Cognizant (48%) that follow a similar business model. In contrast, US tech companies like Amazon, Google, Microsoft and Facebook reported much lower visa denials at 7%, 1%, 3% and 1% respectively. USCIS follows the October to September financial year.
This is in line with what has been happening in the last few years of the Donald Trump administration where the visa regime has become stricter for companies placing employees at thirdparty locations.
“The denial rate for new H-1B petitions for initial employment rose from 6% in FY 2015 to 21% through the third quarter of FY 2020,” said Stuart Anderson of the NFAP. “This is in line with the 21% denial rate for H-1B petitions for initial employment in FY 2019 and the 24% denial rate in FY 2018.”
In June, the USCIS withdrew two earlier memos on contract and itineraries requirements and employeremployee relationship, which were used to deny a large number of the visa applications by services companies.
Anderson said data for the subsequent quarters will show whether the rescission of the memos has an impact on H-1B denials. Demand for H-1B visas remains high with the agency receiving about 275,000 applications for the 85,000 new visas that are issued annually.
The denial rate for H-1B petitions for ‘continuing’ employment, or applications for existing visa holders was 10% in the first quarter of FY 2020, compared to 3% of H-1B petitions for continuing employment in FY 2015 and 5% in FY2017. The agency did not provide this data for the second and third quarters of FY2020.
“Similar to cases for initial employment, among the most recent top 25 employers with the most approved H-1B petitions for continuing employment in FY2019, 10 companies that provide information technology or other services to businesses had denial rates of 11% or higher for H-1B petitions for continuing employment in the first quarter of FY 2020,” said Anderson.
Source: Economic Times