What is in the Visa Database?

The LCA Database is a searchable table of Labor Condition Applications (LCA) that were obtained from the Department of Labor. For more detail on LCAs go to the FAQs page.

What Kind of  Searches are Available?

You have two options. You can do the Easy Search or an Advanced Search.

1. Easy Search - Use the drop down list to select a company name. These companies are a small subset of names that were pre-selected because they are companies with familiar names. All of these searches have been tested and will return results. This is a great way to get acquainted with the types of companies that are in the database. 

2. Advanced Search - You can enter search parameters into Job Category, Job Location by City and State, and company name.

How is Job Category Determined?

Companies are required to enter a numerical code to categorize which job category the H-1B will be. The numerical system used is called the OCC classification system. It is a 3 digit code that is assigned by the employer. You don't see the category code in the search results but it is used to filter the search. 

What is the Enter Number of Records For

You can enter the total number of records returned by the search. If you have a slow modem connection you may want to choose lower numbers to increase the speed at which you obtain results.

Why can't I find a known H-1B employer in the Database?

First verify that you have done the search correctly using the help on this page. If you are sure you are doing the search correctly you may want to try different variations of the company name. Here are some examples:  

• If IBM is listed and "International Business Machines" or "I.B.M." you will not find it by using the company name IBM. Unfortunately companies don't have to state their name using a standard protocol and they often don't. Sometimes you have to be very creative to find it. 

• Find if a larger corporation owns the company you are searching for. As an example the "San Francisco Chronicle" newspaper has very few listings but their owner Disney has many listings. Disney also owns ABC News and Go.com.

If you have done all of those and still can't find the company in the database there could be several reasons:

• The H-1B Visa Database that you see online is not complete. At the time of this writing there are over 615,000 records online. I have about another 500,000 that I still need to put online. This data is about 1 year old. The Department labor has several hundred thousand more of them and are getting hundreds per day. They started getting flooded with LCAs a month before the new 195,000 limit was rubber stamped by congress and President Clinton. ShameH1B will continue to update the database. The problem is that this data takes a lot of web server space and more data costs more money as well as more effort to put it online.

• Not all companies that have H-1Bs on their staff have an LCA. That is because if they hire and H-1B through a bodyshop such as TATA, Mastech, or Wipro, they don't have to have their name listed. As an example, if TATA imports an H-1B and that H-1B is contracted to Microsoft, you will see an LCA for TATA, not Microsoft, in the database. Companies love to use bodyshops because it reduces their accountability for lawsuits and visa disputes.

The first thing you will see on the search page is a synopsis of the search you chose to do. 

Once the search is completed you will see some statistics and the results table.

The Total Records Found is the total number of LCAs that met your search criterion. The Page 1 of ### tells you how many pages you will have to view to see all of the results. You can scroll each page sequentially by going to the bottom of the table and clicking "Next". You can go backwards by clicking "Previous".

I have periodically added more records to the online database and that is what I refer to as "updates". I will be obtaining more recent data and will put it online, hopefully soon. 

The DOL recently told me that they are being deluged with LCAs and simply can't keep up with them.

Here is a history of the updates. This will be an ongoing effort. Check back occasionally to see if an update has occurred.

 Is it possible to determine how many visas  are given under H1-B in a year for a particular job category? 

In theory it is possible to determine how many visas are given, but not from this database. Remember an LCA is an application. Once it's approved it is sent to the INS. There is no way to know how many of these LCAs resulted in actual visas from this database. There is a possibility that this could be determined from the INS I-129 database. 

Why do some companies have so many LCAs?

Assume the DOL entered the data correctly because that is the one thing we can never know for sure. Large companies hire enormous numbers of H-1Bs so they naturally fill out many LCAs for that. Another thing you may be observing is a corporate behavior called "banking". Companies submit an a lot of LCAs so that they can cover future needs. Of course the law says that H-1Bs are to be used to fill empty spots. Obviously banking is another method used to abuse the law. 

  03/31/08