E3 Visas - Work Visas for Australians
The Australian and the U.S. government have signed a treaty
reserving 10,500 work visas for Australian citizens possessing a
bachelor�s degree or a diploma equivalent to a bachelor�s degree.
This new visa category, called E3 Visa, has many similarities to the H-1B Visa category.
But while there is only a total number of 85,000 available H-1B Visas
for all other foreign citizens (with the exception of Chile and
Singapore, which have an aggregate number of 6,800 H-1B1
Visas reserved for their citizens), Australian citizens
have a separate pool of available visas, which is
unlikely to be depleted due to its high number.
Moreover, unlike spouses of H-1B Visa holders, spouses of E3 Visa
holders will be able to obtain employment authorization and the
visa may be extended indefinitely.
On July 19, 2005, the Department of Labor (DOL) issued a rule
that applicants for an E3 Visa had to follow the
provisions for the H-1B Visa. The Department of State (DOS)
published the regulations of this visa category on
September 2, 2005. The DOS� rules are rather short and refer
mostly to its regulation of the H-1B1 Visa category.
H-1B1 Visas are available to citizens from Chile and Singapore
pursuing to a Free Trade Agreement between
these countries and the United States.
TWO STEPS REQUIRED
Step 1: Filing of a Labor Condition Application (LCA) with the
Department of Labor (DOL) attesting that the Australian
worker will be treated equally to U.S. workers.
Step 2: Application for the visa itself either through consular
processing abroad or through a change of status
application with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration
Services (USCIS) within the United States.
THE EMPLOYER�S RESPONSIBILITIES
Regarding the employer�s responsibilities, there are no big
surprises: just like any H-1B employer, the employer of an
Australian citizen�s most important responsibility is to agree
that he or she will be paid the prevailing wage in
the geographic area where he or she will be working. Generally
speaking, the employer cannot offer the Australian citizen
less favorable working conditions than any of his or her U.S.
citizen employees. Another responsibility is to
agree to pay the Australian citizen�s return ticket to his or
her home country in the case that he or she gets dismissed.
GOVERNMENT FEES
According to information available from the U.S. Consulate
in Sydney, there will be only a $100.00 or AUD$130.00
application fee and no visa issuance fee.
According to the regulations of the H-1B1 visa category,
which also apply to the E3 visa category, there will be a
possibility to change one�s visa status to E-3 within the U.S.
This possibility will however only be open to Australians
who are in the U.S. on a valid nonimmigrant visa other
than the visa waiver program visa, such as students on F visa
or workers on H or L visa. The fee for such an application
will be $185.00.
For $1,000.00 additionally, a decision will be mailed within 15 days.
TIME FRAME
The time frame for the application will depend on where the
application will be filed. The application with the DOL will
take approximately 7 days. On the other hand, U.S.
Consulates in different countries have different policies of
accepting foreign (�third country�) nationals and
different waiting times. Canada will not accept any E-3
applications; some posts in Mexico will accept them, but have
quite long waiting times. As a rule of thumb, it should
be feasible to obtain an E3 visa within two months at a
U.S. Consulate abroad and in 2 weeks to 4 months with the
USCIS, with the possibility to await the decision in the
U.S. as long as the petition has been filed while the
former visa status was still valid.