According to the document accessed from the US government's Federal Register, the DHS has adjusted United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) fees by a weighted average increase of 20 per cent, adding new fees for certain immigration benefit requests and establishing multiple fees for non-immigrant worker petitions. This comes after the USCIS, which administers the country's naturalisation and immigration system, appealed to the Congress for a $1.2 billion bailout package amid the Covid-19 pandemic, which has severly impacted green card renewals and immigration processing.
In its official release, the USCIS said, “As required by federal law, USCIS conducted a comprehensive biennial fee review and determined that current fees do not recover the cost of providing adjudication and naturalisation services. DHS is adjusting USCIS fees by a weighted average increase of 20 per cent to help recover its operational costs. Current fees would leave the agency underfunded by about $1 billion per year.”
The filing fees for H-1B high-skill visas has been hiked by 21 per cent to $555, while that for L (intra-company transfer) visas has been increased by 75 per cent to $850. The proposal for the fee hike was put forth in November last year. India's IT industry lobby National Association of Software and Service Companies (Nasscom) and a couple of US pro-immigration bodies, had opposed the move at the time.
The move is expected to have a financial impact on Indian IT firms who are the major beneficiaries of these non-immigrant work visas. L-1 visas are issued for intra-company transfers. For instance, if an Infosys executive moves from India to the company’s office in the US, it will be on an L-1 visa. However, if the same executive is going to the US to work at a client site, he or she will be issued an H-1B visa.
 "US hikes fees for non-immigrant visas; move to impact Indian IT firms")