Nurse Immigration to the USA

Hi, everybody, and welcome. It's Friday, so it must be the connetics USA weekly show onwards and upwards, everything that a nurse needs to know about coming to live and work in the United States. I am your host, Tanya Freedman. And I'm joined today by Chris Macelo. Hi, Chris. Morning. How's everybody? Doing? Good. And also Mike Hammond. Welcome, Mike. How's everybody? Doing? Good. Everybody is good. Our topic today is our expert legal panel question and answer session. And I see we already have lots of questions coming in the chat. I've been sent lots of questions. So if you're just joining us now for many ways around the world, please put into the chat any of your immigration questions. We are very excited today we have two of the best legal minds in the country who, between them, have probably helped more international nurses come to the United States than anyone else. So this is your chance if you have any burning questions for the legal panel. So we're going to get started. And if you're joining now, please stay on until the end of the show. We will be announcing our NCLEX Raffle winner. Connetics has an NCLEX scholarship for those of you who have not yet passed your NCLEX exam. So please apply to connetics USA if you have not applied and see if you're eligible for the scholarship. And then once a month, we pick one lucky winner in addition to the scholarship, where we pay for the exam cost for that nurse. So stay on until the end of the show to find out who's the winner. Okay, so I see we've got Christiana from Nigeria, Burt from Saudi Arabia. Bert is our famous IELTS hero. By the way, if anybody hasn't watched his video, please do so. He is a true inspiration. He failed the IELTS, I think it was seven times. Came to connetics, did our course and passed on the 8th try with an eight. In speaking true inspiration, welcome birth. Nareen from Dubai, Nisa from Saudi Arabia, Shalimi from the Sutton near my home country of South Africa. Mailing from South Korea, Krishna from Singapore, flight from Kenya, Macia from Jamaica. And we have our first question from Marcia to the panel. So, Chris, my question is to the team is that when my passport is stamped after interview and I will need to return to work in Bermuda, can my son travel to Bermuda with me without having any issues? Can your son travel to Bermuda? Yeah. I don't really know the rules on Bermuda, if indeed that's a word, immigration. So the short answer is, I don't know. America certainly isn't going to care where your son moves to. America is only interested in whether or not he will have a visa in the United States. Okay. Thank you, Chris. So there you go. Amarcia Miria is saying how to work as a nurse in the USA. I'm from Albania. So, Amira, we know that this can be a very confusing, complicated, kind of feel, overwhelming process. I would encourage you to look at the connetics USA website where you will see the success path. And the success path is where we will show you all of the steps that you need to take in order to live and work in the United States. You can see the first step is the NCLEX. Second, once you've got the NFL to prepare for the interview. Third is the visa framework. So that's what we're talking about today with the legal expert panel. Fourth is licensing, five get ready plan, six arrival sequence, and seven is to enjoy and prosper. Beatrice is saying I'm doing good. Good to see you all. Welcome, Beatrice. How long is the usual wait period from DQ to get an ID to get an interview date? Mike? Yeah, it depends upon the consulate you're at with some consult, you're getting interviews very quickly in less than 60 days, some of them even a little faster than that. And then in other consultants that have a significant backlog, such as Manila, it is taking quite a bit longer. We can say that we have seen some pretty tremendous improvement in Manila over the last basically since January. So we're now into the fifth month of that that has made things much better. So even if you're waiting what appears to be a long time in Manila, it certainly looks better today than it did, say, sitting in December. Oh, 100%. Chris, would you agree with that? Yes, I would agree. In fact, I was in DC last week at the State Department, and they are hoping to get that back off, even in Manila, back to normal like the time frames Mike suggested around the world sometime in the next about six months. So hopefully we will see great processing times that have been taking place in other embassies begin to take place in Manila as well. Okay. Thank you, Chris. So you heard that news flash onwards and upwards, everybody out of the press. Okay. It's saying why is Perm approval slow? They are sold in October, Mike. Me? Yes. Okay, so first of all, in theory, Perm, the Department of labor does permits on a first in, first out basis. However, that's not really accurate. We're seeing Perm approvals right now in our office ranging all the way from October to December. So pretty big range there. However, we're really not seeing anything beyond that. Sometimes you'll see a delay if the case is going to go to an audit because it's going to take them longer to prepare that other times it's simply they simply haven't gotten to you yet, but they generally have been fairly consistent over the years. It's not fast like it would have been several years ago, but it's not terrible right now. Okay, but not terrible is good news. We have a question here from Anna, which is something that we get almost every month. Chris, do you think there's going to be a retrograde this coming month? In the coming months, yes, I think there will be a retrograde in probably July, certainly no later than August or September. That's the bad news. The good news is that's really related to the end of the US fiscal year, the US fiscal year runs October 1 to September 30. And so the US government is trying us to State Department is trying to use all of the visas they have allocated this fiscal year before the fiscal year ends. And so it's actually a good sign when there's a retrogression in August or September because that means the USCIS and the State Department have used all of their visas for the year. The question really becomes or at least I think the deeper question is, come October, when the next fiscal year starts, will there be a retrogression for worldwide EB3 or Philippine EB3 like there is for Chinese and Indian EB3? I think that's an open question. I think if I had to guess, it wouldn't surprise me if at some point either in the fourth quarter of this year or into next year, we do see a retrogression in those categories because we've continued to see a lot of cases being filed. So short answer is, yeah, they'll probably be a retrogression this summer, but it's going to be temporary. The deeper question is whether or not that retrograde goes into the next fiscal year after October. Okay. All right. So we'll have to wait and see what comes up to see how that pans out. Okay. So let me just see, where were we up to? Arlene? Welcome. Arlene from Jamaica. Michael has a question. I have a prior priority date. connetics filed my I-140. Would I be able to retain my priority date or not? So, Michael, the answer, I would think, is 100% yes if you've got the documentation of that previous priority date, Mike. Yeah. The only time that the priority that is not retained is if the prior I-140 was revoked for fraud or misrepresentation. So aside from that circumstance, then as long as the I-140 has been approved for more than six months, you, as the individual, retained the right to that. And any new employer filing an I 140, you would be able to recapture that priority date. Okay. Thank you, Mike. And we have actually a related question here from Nometa that was sent to me earlier. Nometer is saying I had a previous priority date, and when my new case was approved, my original priority date was not recaptured. What should I do, Chris? You should talk to your attorney because it should get recaptured. Yeah. So there should be no issue with that. I would think normally if you've supplied that documentation. Go ahead. Sorry. Go ahead, Chris. Yes. In my mind, there's only a couple of reasons that it wouldn't be recaptured. Either one, a mistake was made so that's hopefully fixable two, a mistake was made by the US government, and that's also hopefully fixable, though sometimes more difficult because you're dealing with the government. A third reason could be that the original I-140 was somehow withdrawn, and that is sometimes fixable, sometimes not fixable. Yes, I have seen it actually had a case. I think it was on last week where the I-140 had I think the officer just made a mistake. He didn't recapture the original date. And then last Friday, I think it was just a few weeks, and the lawyer was able to make that change. So it was obviously like a clerical error. So hopefully that will be the same for you, Normeta. Okay, Miko has a question. Are exact dates for employment and education necessary for the DS 260? Mike Well, I think the exact day and week and months are not terribly critical in most Schedule A cases because most Schedule A cases aren't requiring experience. However, I think that you need to be as close as you possibly can to the correct date. I think in other types of employment cases, if you're doing, say, medtech or OT's or something that has gone through perm, then the exact dates are much more important. Because experience is likely a requirement. You have to be able to ultimately document that you had, in fact, the experience that you presented to the Department of labor as you're having that supported your perm case. And so I think in some situations, the exact days are important, but I don't think anybody's going to have a problem over a week or something else. The other thing to keep in mind is that when you get leaving letters, often leaving letters will have the last day you were paid, which may or may not coincide with the last day you actually worked. There are some companies that will give you the first day you entered orientation, which may or may not be the first day you were paid. So you may consider yourself not as being employed until such and such date. When you start getting paid, the employer may have considered you a prior date. All those things are very easily explainable if they come up and they're not unusual. So I would not concern myself too much about that. Okay, good. All right. Thank you for that. Mikquel is saying good morning. Address from the UAE, Balani from the UK. I love when everybody puts into the chat where they are from. So if you're joining us now, please put into the chat your name and where you're from. It always feels like the United Nations to me. Everybody from all over the world. So fun. Okay, we have a question here from Harley. It's been 70 days from approval of my I-140. When will I know if my case has been sent to the NVC? And how long is it going to take? Chris, did they say seven days or 70 days yeah. So the NVC process should have been begun. Surely by now it's usually only a few weeks after the I-140 gets approved. So I suggest that they go back and check with their recruiter, employer and or attorney to make sure the NVC process is moving forward, because certainly it should be moving forward by now. Okay, so that's a long time, right? So you need to check that, honey. Okay. Cristiana said I got an I-140 approved in February 2022. It's the same question, 70 days, and yet you get the feeball and also yet to solve the DS 260. I want to know what is the cause? Is it normal and way for it? I can't believe that was the exact same question.  Yeah, it's almost the exact same time for you. A month, I think is not unusual. You start getting more than four to six weeks,  you definitely want to circle back with your employer and your attorney to see what the timing is. Okay, so there you go, Christiana. So Maria is saying thank you for answering her question. Belindle is saying, good morning, Demetrius. Saying, how long does it take to fill in for the I-140? Mike, I think it depends upon whether an employer, the facility you're ultimately going to go to already has a prevailing wage in hand and a posting in hand. So then it doesn't take very long to follow an I-140 a couple of weeks for most law firms to get them filed. If, however, there's not a posting or a prevailing wage done, then it can take several months. Prevailing wages are right now running six plus months posting, depending on whether it's done while the prevailing wages pending or after it's pending takes ten business days plus the 30 day waiting period. The other thing to keep in mind is that right now the wages change on July 1 for the Department of labor. So there's a June 30 cut off date for filings before new prevailing wages need to be used in most circumstances. So sometimes around this time of year, June, July, August, things can be a little bit delayed depending on people's gaps in getting new prevailing wages from the Department of labor. But I think, Tanya, you guys present people only to companies that already have prevailing wages and postings in hand, is that correct? Yeah, correct. Generally not see a delay going with a company like connetics with other companies, maybe it's a new client that they've never worked with before. So it may take honestly, nine months to get a case filed if they've never done the prevailing wage before. Yeah. Thank you, Mike. So, Demetria, just for you to know, at connetics USA, we don't start any recruitment events until the prevailing wage and posting is back from that particular client. All of our clients pay premium processing now, and also we collect your documents before you interview. So it should be a very quick process in the way that we set it up. In the more recent Times Mirror has a question. I did interview in Abu Dhabi. I got approved visa Congrats Mirror, but I put my family to follow to join and to change the case from Abu Dhabi to Manila. But I'm having a hard time to connect with the embassy Manila. My question is, is there expiration on my dependence application, Chris? So the first thing and this is more for other people, I would very rarely suggest that you try to move your appointment. I know it's difficult for people, but unless you're no longer living in the place where your original appointment was set up, it is very difficult to move the cases because you're dealing with the government. And as you see in some of these other properties, whether it's some of the things Mike was talking about with prevailing wage determinations and the Department of labor, where you're talking about other parts of the process, the government just moves very slowly. And so the general point is, unless you have no other options, don't try to move your appointment from one city to another with her specific question if she has the visa. And I think this is what you said, and it's really a follow to join, which is her spouse and children are seeking to come after that. That actually never expires. And so theoretically, even if five years from now, her spouse and children came in and wanted to do their visa appointment, they could still do their visa appointment, provided that she is still a US permanent resident and provided that the spouse and children were spouses and children at the time that she took her green card. Okay. So, Mirabsha, that gives you a lot of peace of mind because as a mom, I know I would probably be having a heart attack to know if my children and my family will be able to come with me. And so hopefully that makes you rest easy that there's no expiration. Thank you for that, Chris. So let me see. I'm just trying to pick out questions that we haven't had before. Michael has a question. How long is the premium processing for the I-140 nowadays? If I had a previous I-140 and my case at NVC with my previous petitioner, will I go back to zero with my new petitioner with connetics. Thanks. Hope I can get an answer. You're going to get an answer, Michael, from Mike. Yeah. So premium processing is running 15 business days. So right around three weeks, it is very rare for the government to take any longer than that. So we rarely see anything go beyond that date. And essentially, you are starting over is what it looks like. It doesn't look like you've gone to an interview stage or anything like that where you might be able to work something out. But it looks like since your prior case maybe had only gone to the NVC. In a sense, you would be starting over again, depending on our conversation earlier about retaining the priority date. You may retain the earlier priority date from the prior petitioner, but the process itself would start over. Okay. So just for clarity's sake, Mike, Michael would be starting over and that he has to file and recapture his original I-140. But because he had a previous priority date, that could speed it up a little bit. Yeah. It depends on what consulate and what countries from and whether we do have something like retrogression, et cetera. So that may be relevant for him. It may not be. Okay  All right, Chris, we have a question from Monique. Monique is asking about the health this is a question we get every month as well. The Health Care Workforce Resilience Act. Any update? Not really. The act, for those of you who don't know, would add about 25,000 visas to just reserve for Schedule A nurses, which would be obviously terrific. The act has sort of reached the ceiling in terms of its support, which is it's got about 25 or so percent of the House in the US Senate, and it's very hard to get legislation passed here in the United States. So that's the downside. It is still being worked on. In fact, I was in Washington last week, and I know that it's being worked on. And my guess is what will happen is there will not be much news, and then it will either just simply fade away this November, this January, when the Congress ends. That's the most likely scenario. I don't think there's a small but realistic chance that it is able to be attached to some larger piece of legislation, but nothing imminent at this point. Okay. Thank you for sharing that. Arlene is asking if you were being filed for an Ione city by a US citizen, which was put on hold because of the status of the Child Act and presidential election, would it affect being filed for through an EB3 visa? Mike, I'm not sure about what you mean by the Child Act in presidential election and how that would relate to an I-140. But if you qualify as a child, if your child qualifies under the EB3 visa, they're under the age of 21, then the fact that there might be a prior filing of any type is not going to prevent them from a subsequent filing. So unless there's something more to it as to why there was a problem with the I-140, it should be fine. Okay. So I mean as well, hopefully that gave you some peace of mind. We have a question from Marisa. I'm currently in the US under EB2 visa and still waiting for the result of the extension of my visa. Yesterday, I was informed that the hospital, my new petitioner, changed my attorney and asked for a draft of the I 485.I'm wondering how long it will take for this process.  Also, what if my visa expires and this application is not approved yet? Do I need to exit? I'm thinking of applying for tourist visa to Canada for my cousin's wedding. Am I allowed to do so while my petition is going to question there for Marisa? Chris. So Marisa, this one's pretty easy, which is this is not a question to be answered in this format. There's a lot of facts about this. You unquestionably need to talk to your attorney before you do anything. Before you go to Canada, apply for Canadian visa, apply for US tourist visa or anything else, you need to get an attorney who's going to look at your specific case. That's the specific answer for Marisa. On the more general point, by and large, you should not expect to come to the United States on a tourist visa and file for adjustments of status. As with all legal processes, there's exceptions to everything. But again, as a general rule of thumb, if you're coming here on a tourist visa, your expectations should not be to file an adjustment of status. Good advice. Okay, Noreen is asking how about Abu Dhabi? Some are DQ since last year, but no interview date yet. But on the other hand, people do queue this year recently and got their interview date immediately. Are they going randomly? Are they doing randomly or country wise? They all are current frustration from Nori and Chris. Mike, sorry, we're actually not seeing a lot of issues out of Buddha. So say that you need to reach out to your recruiter who will reach back out to the attorney and see if they can figure out why you haven't gotten an interview scheduled yet. They're generally a conflict. That's pretty easy to work with and communicate with. And we've not seen no interviews are not necessarily done in exact order. But if you were DQ last year, that's a long time to have not had an interview from there. Okay. Thank you. Mike, just out of curiosity, have you seen any issues with Abu Dhabi? No, I'm with Mike. Abu Dhabi has been one of the bright spots in the last four months or something. We've seen very good most of this year. We've seen good timely processing over there.  Yeah, I agree Same on the side. Okay. Aleem is saying Hi. Have a good day. Thank you, Alim. You too. Anyone's to work in the United States? Alim, as I said at the beginning of the show, go to the connetics USA website to check out our success path and that will give you all of the steps that you need to follow in order to come and live and work in the United States. Arlene has another question. I'm married over 21 years now, divorced in total. I have one name that is now part of my middle name, maiden name, plus my married name. Confusing, right? Yes, that is confusing. I'm not sure exactly of your question. Maybe you can clarify that. Julian is asking if I applied today to the process, how long it takes, considering that I already have NCLEX but not there at the IELTS. That's a good question, Julian. Mike, how long would you say it would take if Julian has his NCLEX but is looking at starting the EB3 green card right now? Well, depend upon what country he was born in and whether we do see some retrograde in the fall or whether we don't. But let's assume that we don't see any retrogression in the fall. Let's be optimistic about that then. I think if we were saying from today for a company that already has PWDs and already has, postings that in the twelve to 18 months is fairly reasonable. Okay, thank you, Mike. Alim is saying can I work in the US without the NCLEX? Chris? Tanya, before I answer that, going back to that name question, we try and use a real simple rule of thumb here, which is the name on your passport should match the name on your educational documents. If they don't, you should be prepared with an affidavit to bridge those two things. And then whatever name is on your passport is the name that we should follow your US immigration on. So that addresses that somewhat confusing name question. What was this question again then, Tanya? So this question from Alim is, can I work in the United States without the NCLEX? So the answer is yes, just not as a nurse, you have to work in some other field. But in order to be a nurse, you need to be licensed in the US. In every jurisdiction in the US requires the NCLEX as a prerequisite to working as a nurse. Okay. Thank you, Chris. Taiwan is asking. Good day. Taiwo from Nigeria. I am a medical technologist. We have many medical technology jobs. So please go ahead to the connetics USA website and apply and our recruiters will be happy to help you with any job opportunities. Mike, can you explain the process for medical technologists to come to the United States? Yes. So medical technologies generally have two routes. They have what we would call a non immigrant or a temporary visa route, and that they qualify for age one, depending on the type of facility they're working at, they may be at a facility that's what we refer to as Cap exempt. Those are facilities that are nonprofits, affiliated with universities, and they can file each one throughout the year. Other facilities that are, say, a private institution or for profit hospital, they can only file H1 cases each once a year under a lottery. This year there was something like $400,000, maybe. I can't remember the exact number, but it was like 465,000 wild for 85,000 spots. So the odds of getting picked in the lottery are small, but obviously somebody gets picked. So that's one route, the other route is coming in directly as a green card holder like our ends do. Sometimes companies will use a mix of those two options, depending on the timing and depending on the facility's interest and willing to spend money. And that different process differs from the RNS and that you have to go through something first called Perm, which is a Department of labor process where the employer has to prove that there's a shortage of US workers. So they have to do a series of recruitment campaigns, advertisements, print ads, newspaper ads, things called job orders, just a variety of steps they have to take to demonstrate. We tried to hire Med Tech, finding up US Med Techs. Therefore, we're turning to this international power for Med Tech. And that process itself can take anywhere from six months if the recruitment is already done to if the recruitment is not done, it can add a year onto the process. And then the process looks the same as it does for an RN with an I-140, generally under premium if you're overseas and then NVC and everything else is the same. So the Med Tech, if they're going through the H1 route, can be fairly quick. If they're not going the H1 route, they're going through the EB3 green card route, then it can take quite a bit longer than it does for an Ari. Okay. Thank you, Mark. That's a great explanation. So, Tywa, I hope that was helpful to you of how Med Tech can come to the United States. And Ted, keep watching out because we're going to be doing a whole show for Med Tech's coming up soon. So Miko is saying thank you for answering my question. I think Alim was the person who asked about coming without NCLEX. Alim is an ICU nurse for nine years in Pakistan. So, Alim, if you go to the connetics USA website and apply, our recruiters will evaluate if you might be eligible for the connetics NCLEX scholarship. We have a scholarship going right now. This is a promotion where we will pay for some of the costs of the NCLEX process and we can see if you might be eligible for that scholarship. If you're not eligible. Also, don't panic, because once you pass the NCLEX, you can come back to us and we'd be able to help you with an employer. We have employers all over the United States. Mike, Chris and I have been doing this for many years, and I'm sure we all agree that we've never seen such explosive demand for health care workers in the United States is what we're seeing right now. Would you agree, Chris and Mike? Yes. One word. Yes. Okay. Pratamish is asking. We get this every month. Can an Indian nurse immigrate USA paying a super fee? Chris, they can Immigrate even without paying a super fee. But unfortunately, the reality is they're going to wait ten years under current processing times. It's a real bad situation. For Indian natives because of the retrogression, unfortunately. Okay. I'm just trying to find questions that we haven't asked already. So Christians got a follow up question on the retrograde, which obviously people when they hear that word, it's very scary. Mike Christian is asking if there is a retrograde this July, how long will that delay our application process? I'm guessing 21 days. Exactly. It's an unknown quantity. Part of the thing that will affect it is will we have any spill over from unused family based visas out of this fiscal year like we have in the last several fiscal years because of covet. So unused family based cases spill over into the employment based side. That's a rare occurrence generally. That never happens. However, during Kobi years that happened the last two fiscal years, I actually expect that it will also happen this fiscal year because I think there's still been a slowdown of a lot of consulates and there's also, frankly, a lot of family based members that maybe not as critical coming that are saying I'm not traveling to the US. I'm just going to stay where I'm at right now until everything gets resolved. So I think there will be some spillover, which I think will affect it in the short term in a positive way. So I would say it will likely be short lived. However, as Tonya mentioned, the demand is so great now and the demand has gone beyond the typical occupations that we've seen, whether it is our end using up the EB3 category. Well, now we're seeing a whole lot of Med techs that are not coming under the H1, that are now coming under green cards because of the large number of H1 B submissions. And we're also seeing a whole lot of other occupations. CNA’s, for example, are coming in under the EB3 category. People ten years ago would have not even considered recruiting CNAs or other types of RTS, Rad texts, et cetera, that are now recruiting. And then you go outside the healthcare field and there's a whole lot of kind of recruitment being done in international hiring in fields that you would normally have not thought of, whether it be truck drivers or whether it be individuals to work in manufacturing facilities. All that creates a great strain on the numbers of EB3. And I think retrogression is inevitable in the long term without some sort of congressional assistance. Yeah. Okay. Chris, anything to add to what Mike is saying about the demand that you're seeing? No, whatever what Mike just said endorse entirely. It's exactly correct. Yeah. And that's what we're seeing as well. I would probably use the word explosive demand. There is explosive demand for specifically, we work with healthcare workers of all types in the United States right now. Okay. Robert has a question. I'm wondering regarding the process of adjustment of status from a contract worker visa. I'm working as an RN her  in Saipan Northern Mariana's Island. Do I need to take the IELTS before working in the US territory? Chris. Yeah. So if your green card is premised on a nursing job, a registered nursing job in the United States, you will need a visa screen or the fairly new Joseph Silny Associates visa certificate. Jsa certificate. You'll need one of those two. Both of those require an English fluency exam. The IELTS exam. So, yes, you will need to. Okay. And because that actually brings me to a question that I have for Julian. So maybe we can just add that on. Can I use either CGFNS or Joseph Sulney? Yes, they're identical. We recently had a situation in the last couple of weeks where one of our nurses attended an interview at Manila in maybe mid April, and she was actually turned down because of the JSA visa screen. That appears to be just a training issue. We brought it up. I brought it up with the Department of State and the Embassies. They acknowledged that it's just a training issue because it's new. It's understandable. I think Mike and I have both been doing this for a long time, Mike. Even longer than me know that sometimes when these rules change as a shot, that was unnecessary. I agree. I get not happy with that, Chris. And in any event, sometimes when these rules change like this, it takes a little while for the embassy to get up to speed. Yeah. So a change can they still need to know that that's what's happened and that's the new ruling. Okay. Marmiel is saying from the DS 260, is it really important to include all my work experience, particularly if you worked in Saudi Arabia previously about seven years ago. As you know, it's impossible to get a police clearance, if not physically there. So me? Yes. Okay. I'm so old now, I can barely hear. So you are upsetting? Mike, that is not okay. Well, it's not the first time. I assure you. The easy answer is that it isn't designed to be flipped, but is that you can't lie to the federal government. So if you work somewhere and you're required to provide that data and provide whatever documentation is necessary, there are a lot of places where police clearances are not possible. And there are ways to deal with that. But simply saying, well, I want to include this because it might be hard to make my process more difficult is not the route to go. So your documentation needs to be accurate. It needs to be complete. Okay. There you go, Momil. Okay. Powell is asking the status of my visa case file that the website is in transit. How long would it take before I get my schedule for the embassy interview, Chris? Well, it's going to depend on the embassy. So for most embassies, we usually see about a three month, maybe four month time between your I-140 approval and your actual embassy interview itself. And so sometime in the middle of that is when you would get your embassy appointment. You'd, of course, have to do the local medicals you have to, of course, make sure your visa screen or JSA certificate is valid. So that's about the timing from I-140 approval until you actually are at the embassy for the interview. Okay. Thank you. But again, it does differ embassy to embassy, just to be clear. Yeah. Okay. I was just about to add that. Okay, good. So there you go, pal. Okay. We have a question from Phil Joseph. I'm asking for a friend. She was previously petitioned as a nurse assistant under the Unskilled worker, but now passed NCLEX and wants to withdraw. She now is working with another agency to be filed as a US nurse. And I see there's a follow up. Her question is, is there going to be a problem when she'll be filed as a US nurse, even though her withdrawal is still in the works? Mike, do you want to take that one? Well, first of all, it's not uncommon for individuals to come in as a nurse aide and then ultimately pass in, collects and complete the licensure process and move into a nurse role. So the path that it looks like she was originally taking is not an unusual path, but it looks like she's simply wanting to completely change that and drop that completely and go with a whole new agency on a whole new process. The prior process is not going to impact that. She may have a priority date she can retain. She may not, depending upon how long the Iwy has been approved for. But I don't think there's any conflict in having a second petition that's pending for a different agency, a different hospital. I don't see a problem. And I think fell just to tell your friends it might not be a problem from an immigration perspective, but if your friend has signed a contract, an offer later with one company, that is a serious matter. So I always encourage people to think of that contract like a marriage. You don't want to go into that with not having good faith and not being committed. So I would suggest that your friend speaks to the agency that originally filed her because I think it's very important to always be ethical and professional in these kinds of situations. Okay. Michael says sorry if I have too many questions. Well, Michael, this is what this forum is all about. It's for your questions. So there seems to be a question here. Let's say that I got approved for a visa in December and the visa stamp in my Philippine passport. Then by January, I'll be a British citizen and get a British passport automatically. The Philippine passport is canceled. Will I be able to use my visa in my Philippine passport and use my British passport to enter? Chris, I got to tell you, I'm not sure I've heard of that one before, so I'm not sure I've got a great answer for it. I probably need to look that up. Mike, have you ever seen something like that? I have. Not unusual. It might be really hard to get a good answer. I think a lot is going to turn on what happens at CPP. I would certainly try to travel on a weekday, not a weekend, because you generally have supervisors that are there. I think worst case scenario, you'd likely get put into deferred inspection for them to go ask someone else, but I would be inclined to try it. Okay, thank you. Smile and smile and enter. Okay. Maybe bring a treat or something with you to the CBP. Yeah. Okay. Doctor, Alyssa is saying I could listen all day. I love this topic. Okay, well, thank you, Alyssa. We love this topic too. Noreen is saying thank you for asking her question. Lorney has a question. How about the RM? What makes you offer? I'm not sure what the RM is. Crystal. Mike, do you know what that means? I don't. I'm not sure what that means. If you want to clarify that, Lonnie. Okay. Promoteesh. We've already answered that question. Samuel is saying please want the full package for international nurse relocation package and support. So, Samuel, at connetics USA, we are direct hire, which means that we are not your employer or your sponsor. So every employer will have their own package. Where in that package it will say, what are they paying you for relocation? What are they giving you for temporary housing? What are they paying in terms of the immigration costs? So all employers will have their own discretionary package. And that will be different per client. The one thing that I can tell you at connetics USA, we have connetics Care package. You can look at that on our website. And those are the things that connetics pay for you. This is something that we implemented at the beginning of the Pandemic. It's our way of paying it forward for connetics CSA nurses. And we pay for a lot of different things, including your IELTS course, free IELTS groups, your IELTS support specialist. We have Raffle. We have the connetics Angel Network, which is a mentorship program, the connetics Compassion Cabinet. Lots of different things that we offer. I'm not going to spend too much time going through that right now, but that is every connetics USA nurse will get the connetics Care package. And you can check that out on our website. Okay, let me just see here. Raymond said, any news for the Expedite process after DQ? Is there a difference in the approval depending on the country? Chris, I think the reality is, as these Embassies and consulates around the world are starting to get back to normal, the Expedite process is just simply going to be unnecessary. So I don't think we're going to be talking about Expedites really very soon. You can still try. There's no harm in trying, but I wouldn't feel that bad if you don't get expedited because I think the State Department's goal is to put the processing times back to more reasonable levels, therefore making the expedite process not really necessary. Okay, so that's good news. And for a lot of nurses who are very frustrated with the expedite process. And just to share from Kinetics perspective, by the way, we have a lot of our clients that are going through their local congressional leadership representatives to try help expedite cases as well. So there's a lot of work going on in that regard as well. But as Chris said, hopefully this is going to be a problem of the past soon. Okay. Roland is asking I've just passed my NCS and I'm planning to apply to your team, connetics USA. How can I start? So, Roland, you would go to connetics USA and to our application. You can actually use our QR code very easy process. And our team will be on standby to help you and see what you're looking for and how we can find the best fit for you. We have many, many opportunities all over the United States. Kim Peloy is asking what is the taxation like for nurses moving to the United States? Mike, immigration question, but go ahead. A general idea, but I'm certainly no tax expert by any stretch of the imagination. But taxation in the US is based upon the amount of money you make. It's not occupation specific. The tax rates go up, the more you make, they get reduced by the number of dependents you have. So if you have twelve kids, you get more of a break than if you only have one. But generally it's all based upon the amount of money that you make. And there's kind of not a ceiling but a floor where you're not actually taxed anything. And in most places you have federal tax, state tax, and in some places you even have city and local tax. There are a few States that have no state tax, but everywhere there is federal tax. Thank you, Mike. And I would also encourage everybody in that regard to watch once a month we have a show called Stateside where we will flag different talk about different States. And as Mike said, some of the States have state tax and some don't. So you'll be able to learn there which ones do and which don't. Thank you for answering that question, Mike. Mitch Kil is asking, can a nurse assistant applied for the green card and how long is the processing time, Chris? Yeah. So I think we went over this a little bit. But the difference between a nursing assistant green card path and a registered nurse green card path is that we have to go through a Department of labor, what we call perm process, which we don't need to get into the details of it, but it adds somewhere in the order of about twelve months to the process. It can vary a little bit and sometimes you can shave that off a little bit if the company regularly engages in trying to hire a foreign nurse aides, because then that recruiting about half, and then it's maybe only about a six or seven month addition to your processing time. But then other than that, it's all the same as the regular nurse process. So if the regular nurse process under normal processing times is about twelve months, you have to add in another twelve months if you're going for a nurse's assistant position. But maybe it's only going to be a total of 18 months if the company regularly engages in hiring nurse aides from foreign countries. Okay. Thank you, Chris. There you go. And Miketel, hopefully that answers your question. Okay. We've got a lot of questions here, so I'm just trying to pick out those that we haven't answered. Is there any age limit? Are you recruiting above 50 years old? Sheeba? Yes. There is no age limit at all in the United States. So that's the good news. Old people can still contribute. Exactly. I agree with you, Mike. I'm way over 50 years. I'm very happy to say there is no age limit. Sheba. Tracy is saying how long normally are your contracts? So Tracy, just to clarify, connetics USA don't have a contract because we are not your employer, we are not your sponsor. The advantage of that is that you will get paid the same as an American nurse with equivalent years of experience because this is direct higher. So this is a permanent full time position that the employees will be offering you. But there might be a commitment period for the expenses that they pay for you to get you to the United States. And in most cases, it will be a three year commitment if it is on an EB three green card. Okay. We've got so many questions, I don't know which one to go with next. Okay. Sarah is asking, can I come on an H1 visa as a nurse, Mike? Generally speaking, no to have an H1 B, there is a requirement that the position require a bachelor's degree. So even though you may have a BSN, the typical education level for all nursing licenses in the US for all States is not a BSN. So there are a limited number of RN positions that would require for an H1 B, the most common one we see would be like a nurse educator type position. But generally speaking, your typical RN, regardless of what specialty you're in at a facility, is not going to qualify for H1. Okay. Thank you. Mike. Arlene has a question. Can a registered nurse certified emergency room nurse apply to work as a CNA until she passes the NCLEX? Chris? Sure. Yes. No, she can apply as a CNA nursing assistant. It's a good idea. As a matter of fact, I think yeah, Arlene one thing that I would also suggest is that you apply to the connetics USA website and see if you qualify for the NCLEX scholarship, because if you apply for the NCLEX scholarship, you can pass the NCLEX before and come on a schedule, a green card, which is a shorter time frame. And then when you get here, you'll be able to work as a registered nurse because you will be earning the same as an American nurse. If you come as a nurse aide, bear in mind, you will be starting off on a nurse aid rate nurse aides salary. Okay. Let me see. Gattol has a question. Can be possible to get an embassy interview without any IELTS results yet, Mike? Well, you may have an interview schedule, but you're not going to be approved to be approved. So this is a very important question. And as Mike said, you might get an interview, but you're not going to be approved if you are not trained in English and you need to pass the IELTS first. So very important for any nurses who are in the green card process to be studying for the IELTS and to pass the IELTS before you get even close to the consulate, because the last thing that you want to do is get to the consulate stage. You have an interview date, you haven't passed the IELTS. You don't have a visa screen, everybody's in a panic. And that's really the last thing that anybody wants. So it's really important to get that IELTS done as soon as possible. We know it can be sometimes more scary for nurses to pass to take the IELTS exam than the NCLEX exam. And that's where I would really encourage you to utilize the connetics USA free course. This is free course for nurses and it really is. As I said right at the beginning, we have had phenomenal success with the course with nurses, even if people have failed the exam beforehand. Okay. On Yinya is saying, must I take the covert vaccine before the embassy interview? Chris? Yes. Okay, sure. Answer to that one. Calvin is asking. My -140 was approved last February 27, but until now there's no feeble. And welcome letter from the NVC. It has been more than four months. Is this normal or do I have to do something, Mike? Yeah. Well, unless my maths around January 27, we're not four months. But it's not that unusual. You're close, you're in the neighborhood of likely getting feebills. Sometimes there's some delay or some reports at Texas Service Center had a little bit of a glitch and sending some notices to NVC. Those generally get worked out fairly quickly. I would not be alarmed at approved January 27 and today's May 6. And you don't have it yet. But you can certainly reach out to your recruiter, your manager, who would reach out and see. And we generally work off of trends. And Chris' offices, I'm sure the same way because we have so many cases in process going off something that the government's saying on some website is fairly irrelevant. When we're seeing a steady stream of here's, the dates we're getting NVC notices from that is much more accurate. And your recruiters will have that information. Yeah, absolutely. So, Calvin, I'm sure you're probably very close. I know it's frustrating and  very distressing, but you're probably very close. As Mike said, Masum is asking Iranian people can get the visa or not. Chris, sure. Yes. Okay. Jennifer has a question for her friend. He has a pulmonary fibrosis from a post covert infection. Does it affect the immigration process, especially his medical from St. Luke's. And we already spoke about the covert vaccine. Mike, do you think this will be a problem for his medical? I do not know. I have no idea. Chris, any ideas on that? Yeah, no idea. I don't know. Okay. So your friend is probably going to have to go through the process, Jennifer, and see on that specific question. Okay. Adina is saying she appreciates this. Michael is saying thank you. Okay. Roland is going to finalize her resume in no time so that she can submit it. Yeah. Roland, thank you. We're excited to get your application. Lonnie is saying about the medical students, do you offer scholarship in here in the Philippines? I'm not sure. Lonnie, if you're talking about maybe medical students like as doctors, sorry, I'm just not 100% sure of that question. Okay. Lawyer says does the recruiter have control over the movement of approved petitions from the USCIS to the NVC? Mike? No, we wish they did because we're all but neither recruiters nor lawyers have control over how quickly. It's simply a function of the government process and it does move at different speeds at different times. Yeah. As Mike said, I wish we had that, but unfortunately we don't. It is up to the government. And I see we're getting a lot of questions about delays of the NVC, and I think we've covered that question prasamish, I think we've already answered that question about Indian nurses. Jennifer is asking what are the requirements for the CNA, Chris? So that will come down to the hospital or employer who's going to employ you. The general rule of thumb. The qualifications aren't very high though, so it's generally not too difficult. The US employers can create their own rules and it's not uncommon to see employers who maybe want a little bit of experience in a health care setting. So it can vary from employer to employer is what we are saying. Okay. Oh, my goodness. I'm so busy looking at the questions. I didn't look at the time and we are like at time. I'm going to take one more question. So there's a question here from Tracy. Can you discuss breach of contract, commitment and penalties or payouts? Tracy, I think that's not really an immigration question. It depends on what you've signed with your previous employer. So I think you would have to look at the contract and see what that breach or penalty payoffs might be on that specific employer. Okay, we are out of time. Okay, last question. Will I be needing an unexpired IELTS result during the consular interview, even if I already have my visa screen? Chris, sorry. One more time. Will I be needing an unexpired IELTS result during the consulate interview even if I already have a visa screen? Technically, no. As long as you get a visa screen, you'll qualify. Okay, good. Lynn, there you have your answer and you can rest easy. We are at the end of the hour. This hour flew by. I literally have in front of me everybody pages and pages of questions. So I apologize if I was not able to get your question. We tried to get through as many as we could and pick the expert panel's brains. So hopefully this was an informative session and helped give you some peace of mind and reassurance about your burning immigration questions. Our legal panel will be back next month, so I want to thank Chris and Mike for joining us today. I know how busy you are. We really appreciate your time and your expertise. And before everybody leaves, I want you to just let everybody know about any upcoming shows that we have onwards and upwards. So you can see today we had our immigration Q and A. Next week we're talking about living and working in Nevada. We have an IELTS bonus class on the 20th and NCLEX bonus class on the 27th. The immigration panel will be back on the 3 June for the next immigration Q and A. So Mark that on your calendars. On the 7th, we have the la for a talk show. This is an interesting one. We're going to be talking about the clinical differences working in the United States as opposed to working overseas. And on the 10th, we have our clients showcase a very prestigious client. See the Sinai. So before we finish off, also we have our winner of our NCLEX Raffle. So we're going to announce the name of the NCLEX Raffle winner. Wait for it. Janik Gordon. Our nursing agency is covering the cost of your NCLEX exam. So Congrats to Monique Gordon. Very exciting. Monique, I hope you've been studying because we want to see you in America soon. And last but not least, connetics initiatives for those people who don't know. Hopefully everybody knows about our free IELTS course, our NCLEX scholarship, $1,000 referral fee, which is extended till May the 31st. Our podcast, Direct Hire, our weekly show. Join us every week and we have many allied needs. So with that said, I want to thank the panel again for joining us. Thank you to everybody all over the world who has joined us today. It has been a fun hour and we will see you next week. Thank you everybody thanks everyone. Bye. Thank you bye.