Moving from Ireland to America/USA

sarah1991young

Hi I am wondering if anyone has any experience in this.

Myself and my partner and our two kids want to move to America, he works for PayPal so were hoping he can get the inter-company transfer visa. My question is where would that leave us if he gets granted the visa does that mean we can go with him automatically or what would we have to do? and also would we have to get married if he could bring us with him?

I would greatly appreciate anyones help as this is a last resort for us.

thebeerbaron

Intercompany transfer will most likely be on an L1 B visa. You will not be able to come with him as you are not married: http://www.immihelp.com/l1-visa/l2-visa.html

jme2010

You can't just put up your hand and say I want a transfer. I work at a huge U.S company based here in Ireland and only Management level can be 'transferred' and there must be a need for them.

#1 Rule in the U.S in at the moment is blunt. "thou shall not give a job to a foreigner that an American can do"

Also he needs to check out the company's policy on transfers. If it's the L1 style and he gets it, you guys should have a quick civil ceremony and it will cover you and let you look for work eventually.

But if it's H1B style you won't be able to work even if married.

What does he do at PayPal?

ceadaoin.

thebeerbaron wrote: »

Intercompany transfer will most likely be on an L1 B visa. You will not be able to come with him as you are not married: http://www.immihelp.com/l1-visa/l2-visa.html

When we first moved to the US myself and my now husband weren't married but I was still able to come on a B2 visa for unmarried partners. Is this not the case for partners of L type visas also?

You can't work on that but it didn't affect me because I can't work as the spouse of an O1 visa holder anyway.

Stenth

I moved from Ireland to the US through an intracompany transfer. I opted for an L1 visa, as that automatically gave my wife an L2 visa with the right to work. If I had gone with a H1-B one she would not have been allowed to work.
Still, it took her three months to get a work permit - she was not allowed to apply for it until after we had moved.

Marriage is required for this visa. We never got any trick questions from immigration, but they did want to see the marriage license. I think the only other option is to be engaged with the intent to marry in the US within a year or so. That might mean flying back to Ireland a couple of times as some applications need to be done there.

For a L visa he needs to have worked at least a year for the company (as an employee, they don't count time worked as a contractor even if it was full time). If your husband doesn't have at least a bachelor's degree things will get a lot more complicated, although not impossible.
Intracompany visas are fairly straight forward. It just takes time and paperwork. So much paperwork. And you can apply for a green card more or less straight away, though the processing time is counted in years.

jme2010

Stenth wrote: »

I moved from Ireland to the US through an intracompany transfer. I opted for an L1 visa, as that automatically gave my wife an L2 visa with the right to work. If I had gone with a H1-B one she would not have been allowed to work.
Still, it took her three months to get a work permit - she was not allowed to apply for it until after we had moved.

Marriage is required for this visa. We never got any trick questions from immigration, but they did want to see the marriage license. I think the only other option is to be engaged with the intent to marry in the US within a year or so. That might mean flying back to Ireland a couple of times as some applications need to be done there.

For a L visa he needs to have worked at least a year for the company (as an employee, they don't count time worked as a contractor even if it was full time). If your husband doesn't have at least a bachelor's degree things will get a lot more complicated, although not impossible.
Intracompany visas are fairly straight forward. It just takes time and paperwork. So much paperwork. And you can apply for a green card more or less straight away, though the processing time is counted in years.

+1 Perfect Answer.

That covers it all, OP.

endofrainbow

Lots of the large multi nationals are cutting back on intercompany transfers, so unless its actually available, there's not much point doing the donkey work.