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Speaker 2: Hi, I'm Gabriella Agostinelli and I'm an attorney with Barardi Immigration Law. The purpose of this video is to go over everything you need to know for your L-1 submission at a port of entry. So first, what is the L-1 category? Well, we call this the Intercompany Transferee Visa. And this is available to individuals who have been employed for at least one full year out of the last three years for a company outside the United States with an affiliated entity inside the United States, both of which are doing business. And you have held either a managerial or specialized knowledge position and your services and presence are needed inside the United States in those same capacities. Now when we are filing an L-1 application for Canadians, we can do so right at the port of entry. That means either the land border or the air port of entry. If applying through the land border, you can simply drive through the border and apply. However, if you are attending at the Peacebridge, which is what we always recommend, at least if you live in Ontario and you're a Canadian, you generally can just go right up to the border and apply. At the Peacebridge, you need an appointment. If you would like to apply at an airport of entry through one of the CBP's pre-clearance locations in Canada, you're absolutely able to do that. But note, you do need to have a ticket in hand for entry to the United States on that day. Otherwise, they're not going to let you apply at that port of entry. So I already explained what an L-1 is. Why don't we talk a little bit about what the documentation is that you need for this application process? Well, if you're applying at a land border or at an airport, you need two copies. At present, you need two copies of your petition, and that petition is going to include a letter of support from your attorney, a set of government forms called Form I-129. It's going to include a set of exhibits that are going to establish the things we talked about earlier, that there's an entity outside the United States and inside the United States that are affiliated, that are doing business, and that you hold a qualifying role. That means you've been employed for one full year by the company, at least, and that you have been engaged to work in either a managerial or specialized knowledge capacity. Now if you are applying as an L-1A manager or executive, the type of documentation we would include would be things like an org chart showing you of direct reports. Or let's say you are a function manager, and you don't really oversee people, but you oversee something at a very high level, and you are the one who has widespread discretionary decision making for that kind of aspect of your position. We would include things to show that you do have the ability to influence the work of other people in your organization in carrying out the management duties of your role. If you are applying as a specialized knowledge employee, what we're going to do is include a host of documents in support of the notion that you have a very intense or acute understanding of the company, its products, its procedures, its technology, its way of doing things, such that you are in a position to be able to best service the U.S. entity where maybe there are gaps in certain learning or education, and you are filling those gaps by being in the United States with regard to that technology or that process or a specific proprietary product that your company has. So your application will include things like manuals for that area of expertise for the products your company has. Any kind of degrees or certifications, we would want to include evidence on that. If you have undergone some kind of training with your company with regard to its way of doing things and its products, we include evidence of that. Your resume. If you have patents, yes, we want to include those as well, because all of this creates this narrative that you are a well-rounded, educated individual when it comes to the thing that you will be doing in the United States. So again, L1A for people managers, function managers, executives, L1B for individuals who are applying for specialized knowledge positions and who have a very heightened understanding about the company and its products and way of doing things. So it's a good idea to read through your entire petition before you go to your appointment. If you want to be familiar with all the contents of the petition, you're going to want to be able to explain how are the companies affiliated, how are the companies actively doing business, and how do I have a qualifying role. Now let's talk about logistics before we talk about talking points. So when it comes to applying at a land border, if it's the Peace Bridge, you will have a set appointment time and a confirmation number. When you drive through over the Peace Bridge or over the land bridge into the United States, you're going to want to tell the officer that you are applying for an L1 and you have your package ready to go. Again at the Peace Bridge, you could say you have a specific appointment and you can give the confirmation number. Now if you are applying at an airport of entry, you will have to clear customs before you enter the United States. And in that case, when you go through the line, the customs line, you will tell the officer at the primary inspection counter, I am here to apply for L1 status. And at both the land border and at both the airport of entry, you will then be directed to the secondary inspection area of Customs and Border Protection. Just a quick note, if you are a nexus holder, do not go through the nexus line at the airport and do not go through the nexus line at the land port of entry. You must speak to an actual officer in the regular lane in order for you to be pulled over into the secondary inspection unit. So you're inside the secondary inspection area. What do you do next? Well, you wait for your name to be called. And when you are called, go up there with both of your packets. And one of two things is going to happen. The officer is either going to tell you, they might ask you a few basic questions. What's your name? What category are you applying under? So no, am I applying as an L1A manager or am I applying for L1B specialized knowledge? And what they're going to do is either ask you, you know, what's your title? Tell me a little bit about your company. And then they might send you down, back down to sit down while they review everything. Or they might keep you up there the entire time. It's totally their decision. Most of the time for L1s, they're going to just ask you a few preliminary questions, have you sit down, and call you back up once they've had a chance to review everything. Now, once you get called back up there, remember, you really don't want to mince your words because you only have a few minutes to really advocate for yourself. So again, if you're applying as a manager, where we're showing that we're overseeing a high level function, or we're overseeing a team of individuals, think about the words that you use when they ask you questions like, what do you do for the company? Explain your role. If you're a manager, I manage this. I oversee that. I direct this. I guide my team on that. I delegate this. Think about the words you're using, lead, manage, direct, delegate, oversee. Those all will help give the officer confidence that you, in fact, do hold a managerial role. When you're speaking about your specialized knowledge duties, if you're applying for an L1B, you're going to want to talk about, I have a unique skill set in X. I am one of the only people in my companies to do Y. I have a very niche skill set. I have rare knowledge within my company. The company in the United States is not currently doing X, Y, Z. This is why they need me. All of this will, again, give confidence to the officer that you're applying for the appropriate category and you, in fact, are eligible. Now, a major recommendation for an L1A and L1B applicant is that when you go to your interview, again, make sure you've read over your letter of support. In that letter of support, we will have talked about your job duties, your credentials, a little bit about the company, how they're related, and how they're doing business. This will give you a lot of the fodder you need for this conversation that you're having with the officer. And we want whatever you've put on paper when speaking about your position to closely match what you're explaining to them about what you actually do. So read that over carefully. And that letter of support will be located following the government forms and just before the table of contents. You know that you've been approved if the government has taken your electronic fingerprints and has taken your photograph. But before we get to that stage, the government might ask a few other questions outside, what do you do, and explain why you have specialized knowledge or why you're a manager. They might want to know things like how long will you be in the United States? Who's paying for this application? Who will be paying you for the time you're in the United States? Are you making a permanent transfer or are you only coming in periodically? There really isn't any wrong answer with regard to these questions. But it is important to note that if you are staying on foreign payroll, that's fine. Many people do that. But if you want to be transferred to the U.S. payroll, that's also totally OK under the U.S. one regulations. OK, so you've been approved. You've had your fingerprints taken. You are in a position where you are ready to start working in the United States. But before we can do that, you are going to have to pay a certain fee. For first time applicants, it's going to be $960. If this is your second application, what you're going to do is you're going to have to pay $460. And that's payable in cash, credit card or check. When you've been approved, you are generally going forward not going to receive any immediate kind of proof of your approval. What I mean by that is in the past, the government at land borders issued a white piece of paper that was stapled into your passport, stamped and stating that you have L-1 status for a certain period of time. At the airport of entry, what they would do is physically stamp your passport upon entry to the United States. Unfortunately, the government has moved away from that now. So you're not going to be given any immediate evidence of your status in the United States. So what happens is that about several weeks or months following your approval, the government will issue something called a Form I-797 Approval Notice. This will be a form from USCIS certifying that you have been granted L-1 status for a certain period of time. But what do we do in between that time? Well, every time you enter the United States, the government is going to track your admission period on something called an I-94 Arrival Departure Record. And in the box below, we are going to provide a link where you can generate your I-94 online. And you can do this by going to a government website and putting in all the information from the bio data page of your passport. And if you print that out and keep it with you for your future travels, that does serve as tangible evidence of your status. But certainly it's important to know that whenever they scan your passport at a port of entry, they will be given a notification that you in fact have L-1 status. OK, so another thing that's important to note for you Nexus holders out there, if you have a Nexus, right now it's most likely not tied to any kind of work authorized status like L-1. So if you have Nexus and you've been approved for the L-1 category, it's very important that you go back to a kiosk in Canada or the United States to a Nexus kiosk and indicate, hey, I've had a change of status inside the United States, I now hold L-1 status. You can bring proof of that I-94 printout or your I-797 approval notice and give that to them so that they can manually update your record to indicate that you have L-1 status. So that now whenever you enter the United States as a Nexus holder, you are going to be automatically scanned in as an L-1 visit, as an L-1 entrance. If you do not do this and you thereafter getting L-1 status attempt to enter the border on just your regular old Nexus without indicating that you've had a change of status, you will be entered as a B-1 or B-2 visitor to the United States. And if you go on to work in the United States after entering as a B-1, B-2 visitor, you are technically now in violation of your status. And that is because you're working as a visitor because that's how you were admitted. You need to be admitted in L-1 status so that you can be therefore authorized to perform work in the United States. Very important point. Don't forget about it. And by the way, if you don't have Nexus, I highly recommend it. It's $50 and it's good for five years. It gives you TSA pre-check at the airport. So you skip the big line. It's really a great investment into your future travel to the United States. And you can use it for business or for pleasure. It's totally fine. Even if your L-1 is synced to your Nexus, you should always enter in L-1 status. And that's the case even if you're coming here to visit, going shopping, going on vacation, that's fine. And if you're entering through the land border and you've been given L-1 status, always use that L-1 when you enter the United States. Keep your record of your classification entry status the same going forward. All right. So let's talk about the unfortunate thing that does happen from time to time where you just get a really picky officer at your initial adjudication. And you're thinking, oh boy, things are not going well. This interview is kind of going downhill. This officer is really not understanding me or I really don't think that they're going to approve me. What do we do? Well, the first thing we do is you say, can I call my attorney? Or if they say no, can you call my attorney and try to understand whatever is causing this hiccup here? They may say yes, they may say no. If they say no, then you say, OK, well, can I please speak to a supervisor? And if that's the case, then they can either say yes or no. If they do let you speak to a supervisor, be sure to advocate for yourself that either you want to speak to your attorney or be able to explain whatever the hiccup is to that supervisor yourself and try to see if you can find common ground. Finally, if you really feel like, look, I'm trying to make peace here. It's not working. I don't see this being approved today. What do we do? In that case, you use these words. You say to the officer, I would like to withdraw my application for admission to the United States. By saying this, what you're doing is you're telling the government, I simply want to turn around and go home as if nothing ever happened. This is short of them denying your application. We do not want them to deny your application because that might have significant impact on your future ability to go back and rehabilitate your case. By the time a denial has come around, depending on the reason why the case was denied, there may be nothing we can do at that point to rehabilitate the case. You know that you're cruising towards a denial where they want to start questioning you under oath or they may take your ink fingerprints. They might ask you what is the citizenship of your parents because they are not legally entitled to question a U.S. citizen. And that's how you know you're going down that path. If that's starting to happen, you say, I would like to withdraw my application for admission. Don't let it get that far if you feel like things are really not going well. OK, but we're going to hope for the best. You're going to have a successful interview. Everything's going to go great. You have a petition that's been prepared properly. If you've had an attorney who is familiar with border practice, prepare this package. And certainly everybody at Brevard Immigration Law is highly experienced with preparing these kinds of petitions and you should be successful. But in either case, please don't hesitate to reach out if you have any questions going forward. We'd be happy to assist you. Good luck with your application and safe travels to the United States. Take care.

Speaker 3: Thanks for watching. Be sure to like our video, subscribe to our YouTube channel and hit that notification button so you never miss one of these important updates. Also, check out the Brevardi blog that's on our website at brevardiimmigrationlaw.com. The blog is updated two to three times a week, contains tons of up-to-date information on policies and trends. You won't want to miss it.