
Today My US Investor Visa Application Was Denied - jerryji
<p><pre><code>  Yesterday I left my wife and 3-month old son

    to come to Singapore for my US investor visa
    
    second interview.

  Today my application was denied

    because the visa officer thinks my $65,000

    startup investment is not substantial.

  This application has cost me countless number of

    hours and $10,000+ to prepare

    that I wanted to ask her if I could have

    invested that time and money in my startup

    would it make my investment substantial?

  But I wasn't given a chance to dispute.

  Today is a long day

    that I wonder why America does not welcome

    entrepreneurs

    and have to rant from a hotel whose desk is

    smaller than my laptop.

  But tomorrow I will return to my wife and son

    and continue to work on my startup

    then write a much longer rant someday.</code></pre>
======
tptacek
I'm wondering why you're surprised, or if I'm reading the wrong material. The
first link on Google is to a site that says only 3000 investment visas are set
aside each year, to investors of $500,000-$1,000,000 and(/or) employers that
will be create 10 full time jobs in the US.

~~~
eugenejen
I think there's a distinction between EB-4 Investor Green Card visa and E-2
treaty investor visa. For EB-4, it takes minimum $1 million and pledge to
create 10 jobs or $500k in high unemployed region and 10 jobs. For E-2 visa it
usually requires $50k to $100k. Of course $200k is a better amount for
immigration authority to consider substantial and there is no quota for visa.

------
Ennis
Come to Canada! Seriously think about it.

Give these a read as well.

<http://www.ictc-ctic.ca/en/Default.aspx>

<http://investincanada.gc.ca/eng/default.aspx>

~~~
boris
The Entrepreneur residence to Canada required net worth of CAD$300,000 which
is quite a lot more than USD$65,000. Plus there are other requirements such as
several years of experience running a business. Finally, if you look at the
application processing times, in most countries it takes 1-2 years.

And it doesn't seem there is a way to start a business in Canada without a
permanent residence.

~~~
Ennis
Yes that's true unforetunately. But getting a work visa in Canada is not
difficult. It's likely with his skills he can find a tech job here. If it's
that important he has access to the US then being in Canada is the best next
option. The extra money would only hurt in his loss of time dedicated to his
startup work.

~~~
menloparkbum
Isn't there a 6 year visa backlog in Canada for skilled immigrants?

~~~
fossb
no... it is usually done in a few months.

The usa has this 6 years backlog..

~~~
menloparkbum
<http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/department/laws-policy/irpa.asp>

"Canada currently has a large backlog of applicants in the skilled worker
immigration category, which translates into wait times of as long as six years
for people to find out if they can come to Canada. "

~~~
Ennis
Again, work visa does not mean immigration. It means he gets to live here and
has access to the US if he needs it. And he has access to VCs and startup
communities as well.

------
Maro
Given that most startups discussed here are Internet-related, enabling people
to do things over the web, the fact that most VCs and entrepeneurs seem to
think that you have to _physically be_ in insanely expensive Silicon Valley is
pure conformism ("You should be on a plane to Silicon Valley NOW!"). Of
course, since they're the ones with money and networking, they turn this
arbitrary dogma into a law of investing. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy. In
the long-run, this is an acpect that entrepeneurs outside the U.S. can turn
against them and outcompete them. Of course it's insanely hard, it's like
trying to outcompete romans 2000 years ago.

~~~
csbartus
We are still living the American Dream on the Internet too.

Given that I'll loose all my HN karma points I'll have to ask stop thinking in
Internet Startup = US.

Stay with your family back home and run a successful business.

Or maybe I'm missing out completely why there is such a gold rush to the
valley.

------
wammin
I feel for you ... the U.S. visa and immigration process sucks. My wife's
parents were denied a visitor's visa to come to our wedding (from Taiwan).

The system is broken, discriminatory, slow and unfair.

~~~
chriskelley
A good friend is a very brilliant Welshman (born and raised there until age
18) now living in southern California. His father has been here for 21 years
and has his US citizenship. My friend, who runs a very successful business and
is also a quality contributor to the local economy, has been stuck in the
paperwork system for 7 years now. Every 6-8 months they send him another
letter telling him it will be another 6-8 months. He can stay legally because
he got here just early enough to miss the "wait for your green-card in your
home country" rule - but they won't grant him re-entry if he leaves - so he's
stuck. Can't take his son back to Wales to see his grandparents, etc etc.

Meanwhile, his father married a Brazilian trophy wife last year who doesn't
work, doesn't volunteer, doesn't contribute economically, who received her
green-card about 3 months after they got married.

The system is flawed.

------
patio11
I feel for you -- I live in Japan and visa issues are near and dear to my
heart.

If it makes you feel any better, you can have a successful business without
being in the US, and should you later want to move the startup to the US
having a successful business and all the fixings (such as a good immigration
lawyer) will make the process quite a bit easier than it is when you're "just
somebody with a gleam in his eye".

Immigration officials in both the US and Japan are not set up for tech
companies, by the way. I used to work in a governmental unit of the prefecture
which, ahem, zealously advocated the national government apply its immigration
laws in the best interests of our prefectural high tech industry. If you're
interested in trying the visa thing again in the near future, see if you can
find yourself a stateside advocate like that. (I'd be kind of surprised if
California doesn't have at least one state office which does something like
that, probably sort of quietly for the obvious reason.)

~~~
staunch
I'm sure other Visas can be tough, but I got my spouse visa in Japan in a few
weeks from the time I started. A couple simple forms, less than $100 in fees,
and a couple trips to the immigration office.

The US is ~$1,400, 6 months, multiple appointments, and a stack of paperwork
for the same thing. Really pathetic. There's no excuse (no, not even volume).

~~~
sho
I am guessing you are white and from a "tier 1" country? Your experience might
have been very different coming from, say, Indonesia. They can go into much
greater detail and require higher standards of evidence if they think there
could be an economic motive to your move.

I can't speak to the US experience but it's basically the same deal in
Australia - a good friend of mine got her spouse visa literally overnight from
the Tokyo embassy, but I've heard stories about it taking 18 months to receive
the same thing if the applicant is from a developing country.

The situation truly sucks, and I wish they could do a better, faster and more
dignity-preserving job, but there _is_ a lot of fraud and motivations of the
applicant can often be questionable. A thai-chinese friend once told me that
one of her friends needed to marry an Australian for visa reasons, and would
pay $25k or more. That opened my eyes a bit. She could just make that much
more working here. Guess the occupation.

There's no excuse, but they do have a lot to deal with.

~~~
scarface548
Its not about status of the country , each country is given a fixed quota .
Usually from developed countries less number of people are trying to come to
America than from say a third world country, so the backlog of a applications
is less , thus the faster processing.

~~~
sho
That may be a factor, but it is not the only factor. When applying for a
spouse visa, someone from (say) Norway has little economic incentive to gain
the visa. As a general rule of thumb, their visa will be subject to less
checks and the marriage assumed to be genuine. They just don't have much
motive to lie or try and fake their way through.

Someone moving from (say) Cambodia, however, will face an entirely different
situation. They plainly have any number of motives to get the hell out of
Cambodia and into a big rich country. These motives can and do lead to fake
marriages, fake information, everything. The application will be given a far
greater level of scrutiny and will take a _lot_ longer.

Hell, don't take my word for it, Australian immigration spells it out. Here's
the official "assessment level" (ie, assumed risk) of people applying for
student visas here:

[http://www.immi.gov.au/students/students/chooser/574-nonjs.h...](http://www.immi.gov.au/students/students/chooser/574-nonjs.htm)

Plan on a miserable experience if you're not from a country in level 1. And
you can be sure there's a much more detailed one for internal use, for
spouses, etc.

~~~
heresy
Too true.

I'm originally from an African country, and trying to get into the US was next
to impossible despite my qualifications (valid), experience (in several
Western countries) and financial position (good).

Five years on, with New Zealand citizenship, I can travel visa-free virtually
everywhere, work in Australia without paperwork, and can expect a short
application process to get into the US, based on the experience of a friend of
mine, who had the same progression.

It sucks if you're on the other end, but to some extent, a greater degree of
scrutiny is warranted when your origin is a country you have motive to get out
from and to commit fraud to do so.

------
algul
The key here is that $65,000 is not enough money for a U.S. investor visa. You
shouldn't have been surprised at all. If the business idea is a good one,
start outside the U.S., and then seek to establish a subsidiary in the U.S.
With a proven track record, you'll get your visa, but by then, you won't want
it because you won't want to pay U.S. taxes.

------
meterplech
This is another sad example of the US's twisted immigration policy. Brilliant
entrepreneurs, scientists, and academics want to come in legally and are
rejected, while thousands of others come in illegally.

~~~
wheels
Not really. There are plenty of examples of that, but this is an example of
someone applying for a special kind of visa that they were obviously not
qualified for and then not getting it. I'm sorry for them on a personal level,
but at an institutional level, the system worked just fine.

~~~
davidw
At an 'institutional level', it's a bunch of horse shit. Sorry, but the whole
mess brings out strong feelings: the process to get my _wife_ (who is also the
mother of our American daughter), into the US is quite a hassle. And we're
talking about someone with a doctorate in biochemistry from a wealthy nation.
Tons of similar stories of intelligent, hard working, qualified people being
hassled to no end. Remember when Linus' visa was about to expire, and only a
ruckus got them to speed the process up?

~~~
wheels
The guy applied for an investor's visa. He's not an investor. If your wife
applied for an investor's visa and not an I'm-married-to-an-American visa and
didn't get it and said, "But I really love my husband." that wouldn't mean
that she'd been unfairly denied.

~~~
davidw
And what other people and I are saying is that the whole system is quite
fucked up and needs a major overhaul. Maybe this guy shouldn't have got in on
this particular visa, but it's still lame; I'd much rather people like that
have the option to go, and then get encouraged to go home if things aren't
working out, or some similar compromise that encourages smart, hard working
people to go to the US.

~~~
wheels
Sure. I agree, which is why my original statement was essentially, "Yes, there
are loads of examples of it being screwed up. This doesn't sound like one of
them."

I definitely agree that the US immigration system is pretty broken, but
assuming that the US system was fixed, and there were still different kinds of
visas, it wouldn't magically be broken again because people got denied for
applying for the wrong kind.

~~~
dandelany
I think you're missing the point: there's no "wrong kind." There's no way for
a non-US Citizen with $65k in the bank to legally come start his or her
business in this country, even though its (relatively) easy for people to slip
across either border. It's not a matter of "oops, I accidentally applied for
the investor visa, I should've picked up the startup-founder visa instead."

PG has written about this idea here:
<http://www.paulgraham.com/foundervisa.html>

------
zaidf
I sympathize with you. But I cannot help wonder why you thought you would get
a visa if you know they are generally given to 500,000-1M investments? Did you
know it would be a longshot anyway?

Good luck with your startup!

------
vaksel
what's stopping you from doing a web(I'm guessing) startup outside of United
States?

~~~
dryicerx
This is my question as well.

Your website seems to be very web-centric business (according to your user
page), what is it that you cannot accomplish regarding this remotely?

~~~
jerryji
Fist of all, I must thank all who have taken the time to read and/or comment
on my post.

However, the fact that US (or more specifically, Silicon Valley) has given
birth to more successful high tech companies per square mile than has anywhere
else in the world is not incidental.

Being able to grow a startup in the fertile land of Silicon Valley means
closer access to a wide array of different classes of investors, world-class
peer entrepreneurs/technologists, and active and mature users, all of which
are big advantages over startups elsewhere -- even with the high cost of
living taken into consideration.

After all, it's like telling a minority student who was rejected by a top
university for (disputablely) unfair reasons that she doesn't need to go to
college to succeed, sure the statement could be true -- just unfortunately not
statistically.

------
natch
It's not always easy to get in, which means the US tends to get immigrants who
have a lot of initiative. This works out great for us. For you, keep trying.
And as others have suggested, work wherever you are to continue developing
your business in the meantime.

As an aside, have you considered having a usability professional do an
evaluation of your web site and business idea? This kind of third-party
opinion might be very valuable. It could even be a student in a usability
program at a decent university, to save money.

Which leads to this thought: Now that you've announced to the world that you
have a (very small) pile of money, I'm sure many people will be glad to help
you spend it. You should be a little more careful and discrete imho.

------
hs
i was denied usa visitor visa in 2007 -- the interviewer said i didn't put
specific date, despite me having entered usa multiple time during the last 25
years

i guess she got a point. i never really miss usa much so i never really
intended to go there, that's why i didn't buy ticket and put specific date

bad things hurt you ONLY if you allow it

i haven't re-applied any visa since then :D ... and no i don't want to go to
usa either, even third-world countries are pretty good these days (i only need
wifi, laptop, really minimalist stuff)

here i got servants for my family, life is pretty relaxed. actually i must say
that my standard of living is higher here than when i lived in usa. the girls
are nicer too, not as materialistic as the usa counterparts.

------
jseliger
"... I wonder why America does not welcome entrepreneurs and have to rant from
a hotel whose desk is smaller than my laptop."

There are one of two possibilities: all is not as it seems based on your
story, or because the U.S. immigration "system" is idiotic. The latter is a
fact, and the only question is whether it applies to your particular case.

------
dbul
_then write a much longer rant someday._

This sounds like you are giving up. I try to abstain from uncouth language on
HN, but there is a saying: "Shit happens." I know little about this situation,
but I do know of other unfair situations: illegal aliens cooking up Japanese
food in the back of a restaurant down the street from me; a small company
outside of Pittsburgh who hired a Chinese person just so the Chinese guy could
get a green card (and then the guy quit as soon as he was on his way).

To quote an inspirational fictional character, _no matter how tough you think
you are it'll always bring you to your knees and keep you there. Permanently
if you let it. You or nobody ain’t never gonna hit as hard as life. But it
ain’t about how hard you hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep
movin forward_

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1tXhJniSEc>

------
mynameishere
So, invest in Singapore. Problem solved.

------
Ennis
I'll add another note. I'm not condoning this but for the sake of all options
being on the table...

If you know a few people who you trust then you can pool all of your money
into one bank account in your name to reach the 500k-1M sum. Alternatively you
can borrow the sum and hold it for a year or 2 and pay the ridiculous interest
that would add up.

Clearly unethical and difficult but it's a very common technique with middle
income would-be immigrants to get in on investor visas or as business
immigrants.

------
alecco
The funny thing is he is trying to be legit. For 5-10k he could've married
some random woman in US to get in, same for his wife.

It's not surprising power is shifting out of US and Europe.

~~~
yardie
The power to move to the US or to Western Europe has not shifted anywhere if
the news and personal anecdotes are to be believed. A lot of developing
countries don't have the infrastructure or the intelligence to create another
Silicon Valley. If anything they are further cementing their power because of
the credit crisis. I was on the phone with a colleague in Hyderabad and he
told me the R&D companies are starving for capital. When everyone was flush
with cash it was easy to open a branch in India, China, or Eastern Europe, but
a lot of companies are running low and those foreign offices are the first to
get cut.

I am aware that they are trying to build their own middle classes, these
things take time and it's going to be a long wait before they can be
completely self-reliant.

~~~
alecco
What about China?

------
seshagiric
May be a basic question but did you go through the visa norms before applying?
The official site clearly mentions at least $500K as minimal investment (and
employ at least 10 people etc) for consideration under the investor visa!

([http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.5af9bb95919f...](http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.5af9bb95919f35e66f614176543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=4ff96138f898d010VgnVCM10000048f3d6a1RCRD))

~~~
shiro
Ok this may be a repeat, but what you are looking at is about _immigrant
visas_ , a.k.a. Green Cards. I believe what OP is talking is a _nonimmigrant
visa_ , probably E-2 treaty investor kind.

Those two visas are so different, thus typically when people are talking about
visas they mean nonimmigrant ones, while the immigrant ones are refered as
Green Cards. But if you look at the official documents, be careful not to be
confused.

~~~
seshagiric
Two things about E-2: \- substantial investment. Looking over the net it seems
'substantial' means at least $200k \- 50% of ownership lies outside USA \-
Candidate leaves USA at the end of business

I am not sure a start up entrepreneur would be interested or can afford 2 & 3

------
ggchappell
> I wonder why America does not welcome entrepreneurs

To be entirely fair, the U.S. _government_ does not welcome entrepreneurs.

And to be more general, the U.S. government no longer welcomes _anyone_ ; even
the ones that are allowed in are treated badly.

If I had my way, this would be one of the top current issues in U.S. politics.
I wonder why it isn't. I especially wonder why the U.S. tourism industry
hasn't been screaming about it for a few years now.

------
newy
jerryji, sorry to hear about your plight. Yes, the immigration system is full
of inane/arbitrary rules and decision-makers. However, we are on _hacker_ news
after all. By definition us hackers are folks who are able to make rules and
systems work towards our own advantage (while careful not to actually break
any such rules). For one I think putting $10k towards E2 paperwork might have
been a bit of a mistake, and perhaps the US consulate in Singapore might not
be the kindest one out there. As some folks have mentioned here on this thread
- think outside the box! Some cities in Canada have a growing startup culture
(Vancouver, for one), and there are multitudes of different immigration
options if you're still set on coming to the US, even if it means relegating
your startup to being a hobby/project and picking up full-time work. As Randy
Pausch put in, brick walls (like immigration) are indeed designed to filter
out folks who don't want things bad enough (or figure out ways around them).
Hope everything works out for you, don't give up.

------
scarface548
As others have said , stay away from America . It's full of
nationalist/protectionist rage these days and guess where its all directed at
- yeah immigrants . I am assuming the reason you want to move is to
collaborate with really smart people and feel the vibe , there are other
countries with lot going on for them without all the nonsensical stuff. Come
to India , seriously.

~~~
yardie
Have you ever heard of anyone applying for an Indian residency visa (IE not
tourist)? I have heard everything from you can't get one to they don't even do
them. I know they have visas for employees of big companies like Microsoft or
Intel. But I have not heard of a single instance of a foreigner going to India
as an entrepeneur.

~~~
scarface548
Yea , No one seems to do that,because everyone seems to be hell bent on being
abused and mistreated by American Redtape without actually evaluating the real
benefits .

------
drawkbox
If you are an entrepreneur this is just one more fuel to your fire to get
there.

------
gojomo
I'm very sorry. US immigration policy is highly arbitrary and irrational. I
hope you succeed wherever you start, and still have the chance and desire to
relocate to the US sometime in the future.

------
volida
Why did it cost $10,000?

~~~
patio11
Immigration law can get expensive in a hurry, and (as an aside which I hope is
unrelated to the current discussion) the people who most need it are the least
capable of assessing providers and the most likely to get taken to the
cleaners by unscrupulous folks.

If you accessed the Internet from outside of the US you'd be bored to tears of
ads, in every language, promising a shot at the US Visa lottery for "very
reasonable application fees".

Edit: Incidentally -- if you'd like to sit down and discuss your (three page)
application for an engineering visa in Japan with someone who speaks English,
that will run you about $2,000. You could do it yourself, too (my company and
I always do), but for people who are inexpert at the magic words, the lawyer
is worth the money. You're paying them largely for their savvy and, ahem, "I'm
important enough to have a high-powered lawyer on my side" rather than for
their ability to read and fill out forms.

The visa process has rather little to do with you and rather a lot to do with
your host country. The letter in support of my most recent application says
"Patrick" once and variations of "Japan" about fourteen times. It was written
by an HR officer who understands how the game is played.

------
nailer
Can you please not post in monospace? You don't have any code in your article
and it makes things difficult to read.

------
csomar
I don't understand the problem with Singapore?? People want to get there and
not to quit!

------
sho
_"Today, My US Investor Visa Application Was Denied"_

You forgot to write "FML"

------
mingyeow
Yup, where did you go to singapore from? (i am from sg)

------
jkuria
I support you man! Keep up the fight!

