Immigration

drunkle

Hi all,

Any words of advice or wisdom on applying for permanent residence without an immigration lawyer. My small company has one employee that we want to sponser and although I have made it my strong reccommendation that we find a lawyer and let an expert handle it, I am concerned that they will decide to have me do it to hold down costs.

Thanks,
D

Down_the_Middle

A word to the wise........altho this is not rocket science stuff, there are many isues that must be addressed to ensure that the person is legally permitted to work, have an active visa, etc....... Spend a 1/2 hr with an INS attorney to be certain you're on the right track... Doing the paperwork yourself is not tedious nor overwhelming, but does require attention to detail and satisfying the compliance issues. This is where the legal counsel can help.

Gillian

Ditto to the above. Don't attempt it yourself. Even if you do most by yourself, with guidance from an immigration attorney you may save yourself a bunch of problems. There are too many pitfalls. For example, some months ago we hired an employee who had a SS card which said "approved for work in the US" or something close to that. We assumed that meant that he was approved to work in the US, a perfectly logical assumption. What the card didn't say was that he was approved to work in the US for the company that sponsored him. We, as the second employer, were required to go through the sponsorship procedures as well. We let him go because had we sponsored him after a year of work, both us and he would have had to fess up to illegal employment - not a good thing.