H-1B Visa Denial: Infosys, Tech Mahindra, Cognizant Sees High Visa Denial Rate

Indian IT companies continue to witness a high denial rate for H-1B nonimmigrant visas in the 3rd quarter of fiscal 2020, according to a study conducted.

For most of the Indian IT companies except TCS, visa denial rates were higher than the average denial rate of 21percent for the first three-quarters of the fiscal. Companies like Infosys, Cognizant, Tech Mahindra, L&T, reported denial rates of 58 percent, 48 percent, 30 percent, and 26 percent, respectively while TCS saw only a 15 percent denial rate. In contrast, American tech companies like Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and Facebook reported much lower visa denials at 1 percent, 7 percent, 3 percent, and 1percent respectively.

Visa denial rates for Indian companies are in-line with what has been happening in the last few years of the Donald Trump administration where visa rules became stricter for companies placing employees at client locations.

Worth mentioning here is that in June, the USCIS withdrew two earlier memos on contract and itineraries requirements and employer-employee relationship that were used to deny a large number of the visa applications by services companies.

The denial rate for H-1B petitions for ‘continuing’ employment or applications for existing visa holders was 10percent in the first quarter of FY2020 as compared to the 3 percent denial rate in FY2015 and 5 percent in FY2017. The agency did not share this data for the 2nd and 3rd quarters of FY2020.