On March 24, 2006, USCIS issued a Public Notice reminding employers about the April 1 date for FY 2007 H-1B filings, and also announced that cases will be more closely scrutinized where employees will work in more than one location for an employer, as well as in sequential employment situations.

Immigration regulations require that where the services of an H-1B professional will be performed in more than one location, an itinerary with the dates and locations of work must be included with the Form I-129 nonimmigrant worker petition. In practice, the USCIS has recognized that due to the long gaps in time between the filing and adjudication of a petition for H-1B classification, as well as the eventual consular processing of the H-1B visa application, unforeseen changes might occur that are not be able to be reflected in the petition package. The March 24 notice suggests, however, that where changes in location can or should be anticipated, detailed itineraries should be provided and warns that omitting itineraries could result in a Request for Evidence (RFE). The USCIS may use the itinerary requirement to determine whether the petitioning employer has prearranged employment for the beneficiary or is otherwise able to utilize the beneficiary's services through the entire period of stay requested in the H-1B petition.

In addition to the apparently tougher stance on inclusion of itineraries with petitions, the March 24 notice also instructed that USCIS will require H-1B professionals who are changing employers to demonstrate that they performed "meaningful work" for the petitioning employer "under circumstances not reflective of fraudulent intent in the original petition."   This step is aimed to eliminate the “gray market” where some companies sponsor H-1B workers and then offer them to other employers for fees soon after they are admitted to the United States.

Given the current processing changes taking place at USCIS, it is difficult to predict the impact of the March 24 notice. It should be noted, however, with USCIS Service Centers’ recent bi-specialization program, which centralizes filings by application and petition type, adjudicators may be further focusing on particular matters affecting the petition types in their jurisdiction, beginning with the itinerary and "meaningful work" issues raised in the notice.

We would like to remind employers to be more cautious when preparing H1B petitions in order to avoid delay in processing and possible RFE.