Kevin Keane

The short answer is: too many to tell.<g>

The long answer is on a separate page

It has been abolished and its functions have been merged into the new Department of Homeland Security (what a name! When I grew up in Germany, the word Homeland was associated with a certain politician who was less than pleasant...) INS used to be part of Department of Justice. There are now three separate agencies that took over these tasks.

The first one is USCIS, or Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services. They administer all your applications.

The second one is BCBP, or Bureau of Customs and Border Patrol. As the name suggests, it actually derived from the old Customs agency and the old Border Patrol portion of INS. They handle the control of who and what comes across our borders.

The third one is BICE, or Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The name suggests that this, too, originated from a merger of some INS and some Customs functions. Purpose of this agency is internal enforcement. They handle deportation hearings, for instance.

This question was suggested by Pedro.

Generally, yes. You can have as many visas as you want in your passport, as long as they are all from different classifications.

Of course, if a consulate or immigration officer canceled one of your visas, that would no longer be good. Also, if you overstayed, the visa you used to enter the USA on that trip would no longer be valid.

Example: you have a B-2 (tourist) visa in your passport, and later start studying and receive an F-1 visa. You can still use the B-2 visa to travel to the USA as a tourist (of course, you can't study if you do that), or you can use the F-1 (together with your I-20, of course) if you want to go to school.

Example: you have an H-1B visa valid until July 4, 2006. On May 7, 2006, you receive another H-1B visa. In this case, the consulate should place a stamp over the old H-1B visa saying "cancelled without prejudice."

You need a visa in most cases if you are entering the USA. It does not matter when the visa expires, as long as it is good on entry.

There are a few exceptions. You do not need a visa if:

• You are from a visa waiver country and plan to come to the US as a tourist or business visitor for no more than 90 days. Note that effective October 1, 2003, you must also have a machine-readable passport (MRP). If you do not have a machine-readable passport, you must apply for a visa even if you are from a visa waiver country. Depending on when your passport was issued, a passport with biometric identifier (an RFID microchip readable by radio) may also be required.
• You are a Canadian citizen without a criminal record, and plan to enter the USA as a non-immigrant. There are a few non-immigrant categories where even Canadian citizens need a visa, though (K, the fiancé visa, is one of them).
• You leave the USA for a short trip (30 day maximum) to Canada or Mexico. If you are an F-1 student, you can also use the same procedure to travel to Caribbean islands. This is known as Automatic Revalidation. There are exceptions to this rule:
  • Your I-94 needs to be still valid when you return.
  • If your status is K-1 or K-2, this is not available.
  • You must have a visa in your passport. The visa can be expired or of a different category, but must be the one you used when entering the USA. Of course, visa waiver tourists are exempt from this requirement.
  • You cannot be a citizen or national of one of the so-called terror-sponsoring nations (Iran, Iraq, Syria, Lybia, Sudan, North Korea and Cuba).
  • You must not have left the country you travelled to (that is, you cannot go to Guatemala from Mexico, or go from Canada to your home country).
  • You must not apply for a US visa in Canada or Mexico. If you do, Automatic Revalidation is no longer available, and you need to have the actual correct type of visa.

Yes. The fee is (as of this writing) US $6 if you cross at a land border. If you arrive by air or commercial ship, the fee is built into your fare.

In short, the I-94 is the form that identifies your status. There are two ways of getting one. The most common is that you fill it out yourself on the flight to the US, on the ship, or if you are driving across the border, by walking into the BCBP office at the border checkpoint.

There are actually several different kinds of I-94. The most common one is the white I-94. It is used for people who arrive in the USA with a visa. There also is a green I-94W. This is used for people who arrive in the USA without a visa as tourists or business visitors from certain countries that are eligible for the visa waiver program (VWPP). Finally, there is a blue I-94T that is used for persons in Transit Without Visa for travel through the USA to an onward destination, with less than eight hours in the US. It is only available for air travel with certain airlines and will not allow you to enter the airport. Also, after 9/11, Transit Without Visa has been suspended and is currently not available.

A status is what you have after you arrive in the USA, until you leave. People outside the USA never have a status. This is true even if you have a long-term visa such as H-1B - your status ends as soon as you leave the USA, even for just a one-day business trip. Don't worry, you'll get a new status as soon as you return. Assuming, of course, that you have the required documents and qualify for the status again.

Your status is documented on form I-94.

The word visa is often misused. A visa is, in effect, an admission ticket. You get it at a US consulate and use it at the airport, seaport or land border crossing when you enter the US. You usually also need it when boarding your flight or ship. When you arrive in the US, the BCBP immigration inspector will look at your passport with the visa in it and grant you a corresponding status.

After you arrive in the USA, you do not need the visa at all, ever! In fact, there are many people whose visa expired or whose visa is of a different category, but yet they are perfectly legally in the USA.

There are two main types of visa: immigrant and non-immigrant. A non-immigrant visa is a sticker in your passport (it used to be a stamp, and in fact the term "visa stamp" is sometimes still used to distinguish it from the term "visa" when you really mean "status"). It takes up a full page in your passport.

An immigrant visa is sometimes also called a "mysterious brown envelope", for that is exactly what it is. The consulate will take all documents that you sent in, the visa application form, medical examination, etc. and put it all into a brown envelope. This envelope is the visa. Remember to keep it sealed; once the seal is broken, the visa would become worthless.

If in doubt, hire a lawyer. Yes, most immigration law issues can be handled by a layperson, but it will take a lot of research before you even get the basics down. To give you an idea, immigration cases are usually as complex as a very difficult income tax return. Of course, it depends on the type of case, some are more difficult than others.

Also, keep in mind that many of USCIS decisions are discretionary rather than dictated by law, as in the case of income taxes. Thus, you not only need to fill out the forms to comply with the law, but also to convince the USCIS officer.

It is perfectly legal to do it by yourself, but you would take a substantial risk.

There is one exception: if your case is a straightforward marriage to a US citizen, it can be beneficial to do it without a lawyer. Involving a lawyer might make USCIS suspicious. However, if there is anything unusual about your case - say, travel on a tourist visa a previous overstay, an unusual type of marriage (for instance, big age difference between the partners) or anything else unusual, DO hire a lawyer anyway!