H-1B Visa Approval Rate Sees No Growth In The Fiscal Year 2019

The controversial H-1B visa approval has been seeing a regular drop for the past few years. The visa allows foreign workers to work in the US. However, this fall has increased after Donald Trump sworn as the President of the US in 2017. His “Buy American and Hire American” executive order which aims at putting the American workers first in priority has ebbed the H-1B visa approval in a considerable percentage.

The federal officials have now intensified the scrutiny and the repudiation of the H-1B visa applications.

The analysis shows that in 2015 the approval rate was 96% which dropped down to 94 in 2016 and to 92 in 2017. However, in 2018 it dropped down to 85%. The latest statistics from U.S Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) reveal that in the US Government’s fiscal year 2019 the rate of H-1B visa application approval has not seen any growth and is maintained at 85% only.

Not only this, the dissection of the H-1B visa application has augmented to the extent that the number of ‘requests for evidence’ has increased significantly. These evidence requests are the documents and information solicit that the visa approving agency asks for from the companies which intend to apply for the visa to validate the authenticity of the application.

The evidence requests were approximately 20% of the applications received till 2017. However, the rate jumped to 38% in 2018 and 40% in 2019.

However, the companies are now demanding to increase the cap on the new H-1B visas as they find it important in order to hire and retain the most deserving talents which need not necessarily belong to the US.