Domestic employees applying for visas to accompany, or follow to join, their employer must meet specific criteria. This includes cooks, butlers, chauffeurs, housekeepers, nannies, aretakers, gardeners, and paid companions, among others.
Personal or domestic servants who are accompanying or following an employer to the United States may be eligible for B-1 visas. This category of domestic employees includes, but is not limited to, cooks, butlers, chauffeurs, housemaids, valets, footmen, nannies, mothers’ helpers, gardeners, and paid companions.
Those accompanying or following to join an employer who is a foreign diplomat or government official may be eligible for an A-3 or G-5 visa, depending upon their employer’s visa status.
Eligibility/ Qualifications
If you are a domestic employee and wish to apply for a B-1 visa, you must demonstrate that:
- The purpose of your trip is to enter the United States for work as a domestic employee
- You plan to remain in the United States for a specific, limited period of time
- Your employer meets certain qualifications
- You have evidence of compelling social and economic ties abroad
- You have a residence outside the United States as well as other binding ties that will ensure you return abroad at the end of your contract.
ELIGIBILITY
Employers eligible to sponsor a B1 domestic employee include nonimmigrant visa (NIV) holders and U.S. citizens visiting the United States temporarily. Foreign diplomats or officials can sponsor a domestic employee for an official visa (A3 or G5). Lawful permanent residents (green card holders) and U.S. citizens who live in the United States cannot sponsor a B1 domestic employee. See below eligibility requirements:
The employer is a nonimmigrant visa (NIV) holder
For B1 domestic employee visa eligibility:
- The employer must have a valid nonimmigrant visa (except visa types C, D, T, or U or
- an official visa).
- The domestic employee must have a residence outside of the United States which they have no intent to abandon.
- The domestic employee must have at least one year of experience as a domestic employee.
- The domestic employee must have been employed by this employer for at least one year prior to the travel date (if accompanying the employer), or one year prior to the employer’s admission to the United States (if following to join.) or;
- The employer must have a history of employing domestic help over several years.
The employer has an official visa
Employers with a valid A, G, or C3 visas may apply for a visa for their domestic employees by following the official visas process.
Accompanying a Nonimmigrant Visa Holder
If you are a domestic employee and wish to accompany or join an employer who is not a U.S. citizen or legal permanent resident, and who seeks admission to, or who is already in, the United States under a B, E, F, H, I, J, L, M, O, P, Q, or R nonimmigrant visa then you may be eligible for a B-1 visa classification, provided:
- You have at least one year’s experience as a personal or domestic employee as attested to by statements from previous employers
- You have been employed outside the United States by your employer for at least one year prior to the date of your employer’s admission to the United States, or
- Your employer-employee relationship existed immediately prior to the time of your employer’s application, and your employer can demonstrate that he or she regularly employed (either year-round or seasonally) domestic help over a period of years preceding the time their application
• You will have no other work, and will receive free room and board and round-trip airfare from your employer as indicated under the terms of the employment contract.
