Visa & More: Frequently Asked Questions

As always, here are a few of our customers' questions, answered by our counselors. All of our counselors possess many years of experience with the American immigration law and have profound knowledge of visa regulations, kept up-to-date by constant further and advanced training.

Please note that the following answers, even if they seem to apply to your individual situation, do not necessarily have to be the correct answer for you.
Since each situation is different, no responsibility is taken for the correctness of this information. To get information and advice for your own individual situation, please only rely on personal counsel and assistance from our experts.

The American Dream GmbH is accredited as an emigration counseling center for the for travel to the US according to German "Auswandererschutzgesetz" (emigrant protection law) and is a member of the American Chamber of Commerce.

Please let us know how we can help you. If you need counseling or an appointment, please contact us and we will assist you flexibly and as soon as possible. Any questions concerning our services and prices can be asked online anytime.

YOUR QUESTION: I am planning to do a five-months internship in Guatemala for university. I will be traveling via Managua. In order to get there, I have to fly to the US first. Do I need to apply for a visa to transit through the US?

OUR ANSWER: You will need a passport valid for admission into the US, i.e. a biometric or machine-readable passport. You won't need a transit visa, for most EU citizens those will not be issued in general. Under the Visa Waiver Program you can also transit the US without a visa.

YOUR QUESTION: I wanted to go to the US as a DJ for my music label to do a promotion tour. I would have been paid as well. At the US airport, however, I wasn't admitted into the country because I didn't have a work visa. They told me, I would have needed to obtain a B-2 visa. When I got back to Germany and applied for a B-2 visa, this was denied because they said I couldn't prove that I didn't want to immigrate into the US. What can I do?

OUR ANSWER: There are two answers to your question: you should have been holding a valid P-visa (not B-2) to enter the US. This, however, will only in very few cases be issued to a single entertainer (usually only to entertainment groups). A US agent would have had to apply for this in the US prior to your departure, in order to obtain a work permit for you. A B-visa would not have been the right visa for you, because it can not be used as a work permit.

When you applied for the visa at the US consulate, you have apparently given the impression that you are intending to live and work in the US one day. This is another reason you will need a P-visa - in case you wish to apply again - because with this it usually cannot be assumed that you plan to immigrate. Those performances you planned and organized yourself are not legal. Since your intent to immigrate has now been put on record, we unfortunately have to inform you that it might be very difficult for you to qualify for a P-visa in the near future. You also have to be prepared to run into trouble with visa-free travel, since US border officials have access to your files as well.

YOUR QUESTION: My son, 16 years old, 10th grade in Gymnasium (German academic high school) would like to go to the US in the summer of 2008 to attend a US high school for one year. We have relatives in California who would take him in. What requirements (visa etc) are there to go to the US for one year as a student?

OUR ANSWER: Your son will either need a J-1 visa that can be obtained by applying via a German or German-American exchange organization, which is approved by the US. Those organizations, however, usually also choose the host families. Or you have to enroll your son at a SEVIS approved US high school. SEVIS means the high school is registered with US Citizenship and Immigration Services and allowed to take in foreign students. There you will receive the so-called form I-20, that your son can use to apply for the F-1 visa. Our advise: refer to the following homepage for further information: http://www.ice.gov/doclib/sevis/pdf/ApprovedSchools.pdf. On this page, all US schools are listed that have been approved by USCIS and are allowed to take in foreign students.

Please note: As we have mentioned in previous editions of our newsletter, enrolling at a public school that is not SEVIS approved - even if that school, ignorant of the legal requirements, is offering a place - is an illegal action and can lead to immediate deportation as well as an entry ban of up to ten years.

YOUR QUESTION: I found an employer in the US who would like to hire me. At first, however, he has to check whether any US citizen is qualified for the job. I have been in the US with a B1/B2 visa in 2007. I would like to apply for citizenship.

OUR ANSWER: That depends on what procedure the employer has chosen. In case he chose the so-called PERM/Labor Certification process and this will be approved, the next step will be a petition to US Citizenship and Immigration Services and then a permanent stay. Depending on the immigrant visa category, this may take between 12 to 14, mostly 18 to 24 or even 36 months. Based on the green card that will be issued, a naturalization application will be possible after five years, provided you can prove that you have been continuously in the US for a minimum period of 30 months before submitting your application. In case the employer has filed a Temporary Labor Certification, this usually leads to a temporary work visa for a maximum period of three years. For that, enough H-2B visas have to be available at the time of application. After that, you will either have to leave the country, or the employer will have to apply for a change of status to another appropriate work visa (before the end of the three years). This visa, however, is not really the right one for filing a green card application and will not lead to naturalization.

YOUR QUESTION: A friend and I applied for the H-2A visa at the US embassy and I was rejected. We do have an employer in the US who had also issued us the I-797 petition. My friend's application was approved, mine wasn't. The reason they gave me was that I didn't have sufficient ties to Germany and might want to stay in the US. They didn't even ask me about any ties to Germany, e.g. apartment, car, family etc. Now my question is how and when can I re-apply for a visa?

OUR ANSWER: According to our experience, applying again will probably not help, if they suspect that you intend to immigrate (they will still assume that when you apply next time). You may have given information on your application or said something during the interview that led to this assumption. The consular officials don't have to ask you about close ties to your country, it is already enough if they get the impression from your behavior or your responses to certain questions and don't get any information proving the opposite during the interview. Unfortunately, we cannot advise you to apply again.