Matter of Smith

• Decision Date: 17 May 1968
• Docket Number: A-17583656.,Interim Decision Number 1875
• Parties: MATTER OF SMITH. In Visa Petition Proceedings.
• Court: U.S. DOJ Board of Immigration Appeals

12 I&N Dec. 772

MATTER OF SMITH.

In Visa Petition Proceedings.

Interim Decision Number 1875

A-17583656.

Board of Immigration Appeals.

Decided by District Director May 17, 1968.

Sixth preference classification as a secretary is accorded the beneficiary of a visa petition filed by an agency which furnishes secretarial, stenographic and other office personnel services to client firms on a temporary basis, since the petitioning agency, which will pay beneficiary directly and has guaranteed her full-time permanent employment for 52 weeks a year with fringe benefits, is the actual employer of the beneficiary and the employment offer is not of a seasonal or temporary nature.

The petitioner is a well-established company which operates two distinct divisions in New York City and in other cities of the United States and the world. One division operates as an employment service in the traditional sense, accepting job offers from employers and making referrals of applicants to those jobs. If the applicant is hired, he becomes the actual employee of the company to whom the referral was made. The other division of the company operates as an agency which furnishes secretarial, stenographic, and other office personnel to client firms which desire the services of such personnel on a full-time but temporary basis. Personnel utilized by this division, however, are considered by the petitioner to be its employees. The petitioner desires to employ the beneficiary as a secretary in this division of the company. In order to establish the beneficiary's eligibility for sixth preference classification the offer of employment must not be "of a temporary or seasonal" nature within the meaning of section 203(a)(6) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, as amended, and the petitioner must qualify as the actual employer of the beneficiary.

The beneficiary completed a two-year full-time secretarial training program at the North-East Essex Technical College, Colchester, England in July 1957. Her program of instruction included typing, stenography, accounting, and general commercial subjects. She has been employed as a secretary by various firms in England since September 1957, and her employers have included a bank, a hospital, a publishing house, and various commercial firms. The beneficiary intends to engage in her occupation in the United States as a secretary having accepted a position with the Brook Street Bureau of Mayfair, Ltd., New York, New York.

The occupation of...