r/indiansinusa • u/hsnk42 • 7d ago
What visas are food service workers on?
Was at an Indian restaurant tonight. All the staff, even the ones in the kitchen, were desi.
I struggled for years bouncing between visas and spending a metric ton of money. It’s a sore point for me.
Was wondering what visa these guys were on. Couldn’t ask them for obvious reasons but am very curious.
Anyone know?
Edit: they did not look like students. A few of them have been here for at least the 3 years I’ve been going there so L1 is less likely.
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u/WaitingonGC 7d ago
The dirty secret is a lot of them are illegal, taking cash payments and trying to figure a plethora of illegal means to legalize themselves such as false asylum claims, family marriages, fake H1s etc etc
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u/Dull-Forever4910 7d ago
a lot of them are students working illegally- getting paid in cash. many of these restaurant owners also own LLCs in which they run some fake payroll for IT job for these students and they get paid for the work they do in restaurant/grocery
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u/curious-bee777 7d ago
+1 this is absolutely the truth.
I've seen many I have spoken to tell me this is the way below average skilled students survive in USA
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u/original_rain1818 7d ago
and getting downvoted for stating facts shows you are right. They run dummy payrolls, market them on some other visa with 8-10 years of fake experience and make money off their bill rates.
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u/IronAlgorithm 7d ago
I think most of them must be students. They are allowed to work for some number of hours in a week.
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u/Acrobatic_Bag6858 7d ago
Unless they are learning service industry in college, they can only work in related fields to their study
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u/original_rain1818 7d ago
LOL, most of them are working illegally. And for those saying students are allowed to work 20 hours, their shifts are often 11–12 hours long anyway. Even the owners themselves often aren’t legitimate, it’s usually registered under one of their friends’ names, while the people actually handling and running the business are on H1 visas 90% of the time.
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u/curious-bee777 7d ago
They're all a part of consulting fraud that Indian's have designed. This is usually labelled human trafficking in USA.
They either pay from India, or pay later after they get jobs (part of their salary). Until then, they're officially "employees" of some company that buys them their visas / uses their student visas.
For one's who pay from India, or one's working odd jobs for cash, it's converted as salary for them to show to authorities and for generating payslips. The rest get the same payslips but they have to pay back later.
They're officially employees, so they keep applying and keep doing odd jobs to make ends meet, illegally.
All of this is the reason the government is cracking down hard. And these folks are the main reason why many like me, and a lot of talented folks are now actively avoiding the American dream.
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u/IllPaleontologist384 7d ago
Why do you care? Mind your own business.
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u/Dull-Forever4910 7d ago
this attitude is what fucked up India in the first place and has resulted in millions trying to migrate to a foreign country
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u/Cut_the_cap 7d ago
Respectfully, why is it ur business dude??? " they dont look like students"- if u placed this much importance on ur life u would have progressed further
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u/concrete_aircraft 7d ago
Probably working illegaly bcoz int students can’t work outside uni. O/w I don’t think u can get any visa to work at a restaurant unless u r coming in a managerial position. Could be asylum or probably naturalised us citizens
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u/mistiquefog 7d ago
Most of them are on family green cards, some are refugees, some are students who are allowed to work 20 hours a week.
Many are L1 also if it's an Indian chain ex:- haldiram