US reaches cap for FY22 H-1B petitions, starts accepting applications for FY23
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FY22 H-1B Petitions: A US federal agency said on Monday that it has received a sufficient number of petitions needed to reach the Congressionally-mandated cap for the H-1B visa for the fiscal year 2022. This comes a day prior to the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) will officially begin accepting petitions for the fiscal year 2023 which will begin from 1st October 2022 for the agency. The agency will accept applications from 1st March to 18th March 2022.
“We will continue to accept and process petitions that are otherwise exempt from the cap. Petitions filed for current H-1B workers who have been counted previously against the cap, who still hold their cap number, are absolved from the FY 2022 H-1B cap,” said the agency in a statement.
This year, the USCIS needed to conduct three visa lotteries. To meet the mandated cap of 65,000 regular visas and 20,000 under the master’s cap. The earlier year as well, the agency had conducted two lotteries, which was a departure from the norm. Normally, the USCIS gets enough applications after the first round of selection is finished. In July 2021, the US immigration agency had conducted a second random of selections. As it hadn’t gotten an adequate number of applications after the first lottery.
FY22 H-1B petitions
The USCIS follows an October to September year, and candidates chosen for FY2022 would be eligible to begin work from October 2022. In November, it said it would be conducting the third lottery to reach its target. Moreover, immigration attorneys attributed this to fewer employers going through with their applications. After being selected with employees continuing to work remotely.
Earlier, the agency had said that it had gotten 2,75,000 petitions for FY2021, around 67% of which were for Indian candidates. However, when the travel and business closures went into effect in April 2020. Because of the Covid-19 pandemic, several employers did not go through with their visa filings, said legal advisors.
[Is it legal for an H1B employee to be the beneficiary of multiple lottery registrations?]
In the last few years, Indian organizations have been reducing the proportion of workers they utilize on H-1B visas. Even as American tech companies have been increasing the number of individuals they bring into the country on these visas. An often-cited reason is the shortage of highly skilled tech talent in the country. Through the pandemic, the unemployment rates for technology jobs have stayed low. Also, highlighting the high demand that exists in this space.
