Reminder: H-1B Filing Season Starts MONDAY

This is a friendly reminder that the Fiscal Year 2013 (FY2013) H-1B filing season will begin on Monday April 2, 2012. For the last several years the H-1B cap season has averaged nine months before all 65,000 H-1B regular cap slots were used. However, with the U.S. economy improving, some expect that the 65,000 H-1B regular cap slots will be used by Summer 2012, perhaps as soon as May 2012.

Any cap-subject H-1B petition that is filed after April 1 allows the Beneficiary to begin working in H-1B status on October 1, 2012. Students who hold F-1 OPT student status can remain with valid work authorization through October 1, 2012, provided that their H-1B Petition is field and accepted by USCIS.

H-1B cap-subject petitions include:

• New overseas H-1B hires;
• Beneficiaries on another non-immigrant status, such as H-4, L-1, or F-1;
• H-1B workers who hold H-1B cap-exempt status by virtue of the filing of the H-1B with a University or research facility.

To read the full article, please click here.

Should you have any Immigration Law questions or concerns, please contact us.

(c) Picture: freedigitalphotos.net

Neu in North Carolina: Wie bekomme ich einen Führerschein?

Zieht man dauerhaft nach North Carolina, muss man als Autofahrer spätestens nach 60 Tagen einen Führerschein beantragen. Zudem muss man einen Führerschein aus North Carolina vorweisen, um ein Auto in North Carolina anzumelden.

Bis man seinen Führerschein aus North Carolina beantragt und bekommen hat, kann man mit seinem ausländischen Führerschein fahren. Der internationale Führerschein wird in North Carolina, wie in einigen anderen U.S. Bundesstaaten, dagegen nicht anerkannt.

Um Ihren North Carolina Führerschein zu beantragen, müssen Sie

• Ihr Alter und Ihre Identität nachweisen. Dafür werden 2 Dokumente benötigt. Für Ausländer am einfachsten ist es, Ihren Reisepass mit dem I-94 Einreise-/Ausreise-Formular mitzubringen.

• Ihre Social Security Card vorlegen.

• Ihre Aufenthaltsberechtigung vorweisen. Dies kann z.B. mit dem I-94 bzw. Ihrem Visum erfolgen.

• eine Haftpflichtversicherung für Ihr Fahrzeug nachweisen, z.B. durch eine Versicherungskarte Ihrer Versicherung.

Schließlich müssen Sie eine schriftliche und praktische Prüfung ablegen, als auch die notwendigen Gebühren entrichten. Genauere Informationen hierzu finden sich hier.

Die offizielle Webseite des N.C. Division of Motor Vehicles finden Sie im Übrigen hier.

In diesem Sinne: Gute Fahrt!

(c) Picture: freedigitalphotos.net

Wie bekomme ich eine Social Security Number mit einem Non-Immigrant Visum?

Das beantragen einer Sozialversicherungsnummer, die sog. Social Security Number (SSN), ist erfreulich einfach. Die Nummer wird nicht nur von Arbeitgebern benötigt, sie wird in den USA als allgemeines Personenkennzeichen verwendet und sollte daher möglich frühzeitig beantragt werden. Mit der SSN kann man erheblich einfacher mit Behörden und anderen Institution, wie z.B. Banken, geschäftlich in Kontakt treten.

Aktuell gelten die folgenden Voraussetzungen zur Beantragung:

• Eine ausgefüllte Application for a Social Security Card (Form SS-5).
  
  
• Zwei Original-Urkunden, die zusammen
  - Ihre Identität,
  - Ihr Alter,
  - und ihren Einwanderungsstatus, aus der hervorgeht, dass Sie arbeitsberechtigt sind.
  

nachweisen.

Der Einwanderungsstatus kann z.B. mit den Formularen I-765 (work permit) oder I-94 (Arrival/Departure Record) belegt werden. In den meisten Fällen reicht das Formular I-94 aus.

Falls Sie mit mit einem F-1, M-1 oder J-1/2 Visum eingereist sind, gelten besondere Vorschriften, die Sie hier nachlesen können.

Mit diesen Dokumenten gehen Sie zu Ihrem örtlichen Social Security Office. Eine Suchmaschine dafür findet sich hier.

Es wird empfohlen, mit der Beantragung bis 10 Tage nach Ihrer Einreise zu warten, damit alle Informationen in den jeweiligen staatlichen Datenbanken eingepflegt sind und die Sozialversicherungsbehörde auf diese zugreifen kann. Das Beantragen einer Sozialversicherungsnummer ist kostenlos.

Die jeweils aktuellen Voraussetzungen für die Beantragung einer Social Security Number können Sie hier nachlesen. Gerne sind wir Ihnen bei der Beantragung der Social Security Number behilflich.

(c) Picture: Social Security Administration

U.S. Supreme Court October 2011 Term – A Brief Overview

The current October 2011 term of the United States Supreme Court is loaded with a number of high-profile cases. In this article, we will be highlighting three of the cases. We already published an article about the case challenging health care reform here.

Arizona v. U.S. will be heard April, 25, 2012, with a decision expected sometime late June. We previously informed you about Arizona S.B. 1070 on our blog. The law makes it illegal for an undocumented immigrant to apply for a job or be in the state of Arizona. Law enforcement is also given the right to arrest someone without a warrant if there is probable cause that the person has ever done something that would permit deportation.

The federal government filed suit, arguing that federal immigration laws “override” Arizona's laws. Two lower courts already agreed with the federal government.

One of the nine justices on the Supreme Court, Justice Kagan, was involved in Arizona v. U.S. in her previous role as United States Solicitor General. She has therefore recused herself, leaving the remaining eight justices to decide the case. The trial court's decision will stand if the Justices are evenly split.

The case is sure to be closely followed by all the other states who adopted similar laws to Arizona's S.B. 1070.

Mayo Collaborative Services v. Prometheus Laboratories Inc. has already been heard and decided. The case was about patentability and the scope of the prohibition on patenting natural laws, specifically regarding medical diagnostic tools.

In its opinion, the Court stated that “[i]f a law of nature is not patentable, then neither is a process reciting a law of nature, unless that process has additional features that provide practical assurance that the process is more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize the law of nature itself.” The Court went on to explain that the application of the law must be “inventive” in order for it to be patentable.

As Ronald Mann writes on his blog, the case will have a significant impact not only on the medical and biotech field, but also on the software industry. It is likely that the United States Patent Office will be less generous in granting patents.

A further case that has already been heard and decided is United States v. Jones, in which the government installed a GPS tracking device on the car of a nightclub operator to obtain evidence of his role in trafficking drugs. The problem was that the government did not obtain a warrant prior to the installation of the tracking device.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia quashed Jones's conviction on grounds that installing the GPS tracker without a warrant violated his Fourth Amendment right to be free of “unreasonable searches and seizures.” The Justices, however, were divided on why exactly using the GPS violated his rights, as blogger Amy Howe explains in her blog post. Nevertheless, at the end of the day,the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the police violated the Constitution when they placed a Global Positioning System tracking device Jones’s car and tracked its movements for 28 days.

(c) Picture: freedigitalphotos.net

Supreme Court Hearings on ObamaCare Start Today

Today is the first of three days of oral arguments before the United States Supreme Court on the constitutionality of what is now generally known as ObamaCare, the epic 2010 health care overhaul law that in effect introduces mandatory health insurance by placing penalties on individuals who are uninsured. Arguments are scheduled for six hours over all - the longest in over 40 years. Experienced Supreme Court lawyers say that even a single 30-minute session is exhausting.

Today's Monday session is all about jurisdiction and whether the Court is barred from hearing the case until the first penalties are due in 2015. The proponents of this view point to the 1867 federal Anti-Injunction Act, which says “no suit for the purpose of restraining the assessment or collection of any tax shall be maintained in any court by any person.” Or, in other words, that filing suit does not postpone your duty to pay taxes.

Because penalties for not having insurance only start in 2014 and must be paid on federal tax returns in 2015, some, including two federal appeals courts, believe that federal courts are barred from hearing the case at this time.

However, neither side to the argument objects to having the Court decide now. At the appeals court, the Obama administration dropped its initial objection in favor of a swift decision. The question, therefore, is whether the Anti-Injunction Act is jurisdictional, i.e. whether it must be followed even though neither side is raising it.

The question of jurisdictionality, as applied to the health care law, is very exciting and nuanced. For example, is the penalty a tax in the sense of the Anti-Injunction Act? Does the Anti-Injunction Act only prevent private parties or also states from challenging ObamaCare? The New York Times has a highly recommended overview.

Tomorrow's Tuesday session will be on whether the Constitution grants the federal government the power to mandate health insurance, either through the Commerce Clause or through its ability to levy taxes.

Wednesday morning will see arguments on what should happen if the requirement to obtain health insurance is struck down. Must the whole law be shelved or can the balance remain?

Finally, Wednesday afternoon will be about whether Congress was permitted to expand the eligibility and coverage thresholds that states must follow if they are to remain eligible for Medicaid, a federal-state health care program for the poor and disabled.

It is an exciting week and we will make sure to keep you posted on the breaking news about this case.

(c) Picture: http://www.supremecourt.gov/

.com Domain Names Worldwide Seizable by U.S. Authorities

… or, as Wired puts it: Uncle Sam: If It Ends in .Com, It’s .Seizable. But, let's first back-up a bit....

What exactly are domain names? A domain name is an easy-to-remember mnemonic to the underlying Internet Protocol (IP) address, the true address of each website. The domain name bridgehouselaw.us, for example, points to the IP address 82.165.120.197. The latter is much more difficult to remember, of course. Hence the use and usefulness of mnemonic domain names.

When you enter a domain name such as bridgehouselaw.us, the name is “resolved” by computers called Domain Name Resolvers, which are part of the Domain Name System (DNS), a type of switchboard or address book for the internet. The DNS tells the querying computer which IP address the domain name bridgehouselaw.us is currently pointing to.

Whoever controls the DNS controls a very valuable piece of real estate. The DNS gives you the power to redirect domain name queries to any IP address.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), established by the Clinton administration in 1998 and subject to loose oversight by the U.S. Department of Commerce, manages the DNS. It does so by enlisting the help of other organizations to manage the authoritative registries of different Top-level Domains (TLDs).

TLDs are the various endings domain names have. The most common is .com. Others that are of interest of here are .net, .cc, .tv and .name. These TLDs are all managed by the Reston, Virginia, based company Verisign, Inc.

TLDs are called top-level domains because they are at the top of the hierarchical structure of the internet address system. It is more or less like resolving a physical mailing address. Here is an example: if you were in Germany and were given a letter for BridgehouseLaw Charlotte, 212 South Tryon Street, Suite 325, Charlotte, NC 28281, USA, you would resolve the address by going from the general to the specific. You would first check the country the addressee is in, then the region in the country, the city, the street, the house and suite number and finally the name of the individual to whom the letter was addressed.

Because Verisign operates the so-called authoritative registry for the above-mentioned TLDs, it can change the IP address underlying any domain name that uses one of the TLDs under its control. And that is how U.S. authorities can -and do- seize any .com address.

While you and I can register a .com domain with a domain name registrar that might be located anywhere in the world, the domain name registrar must pass on the information to Verisign and ask for the new domain name to be listed in its authoritative registry for .com domain names. Remember, the registry needs to be updated because there needs to be one authoritative source telling everybody what IP address a domain name is pointing to.

Verisign is a U.S. company. As such, it is required to comply with U.S. court orders. If a U.S. court finds a foreign-based website to be distributing material illegal under U.S. law, such as pirated blockbusters, it can issue a court order to seize the domain.

That is what happened to bodog.com, a sports-betting website that had registered its domain with a company in Canada. bodog.com now points to a site telling you that the domain name has been seized by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement – Homeland Security Investigations, Office of the Special Agent in Charge, Baltimore, MD, in accordance with a warrant obtained by the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland.

Consequently, if a foreign website is deemed illegal in the U.S., the domain can be seized even if the website's activity is legal in its home country. The problem with a seizure effected by redirecting the domain name to a different IP address, as in the case of bodog.com, is that the website becomes unavailable for users worldwide and not just in the U.S., where it was found to be illegal.

EasyDNS, a domain name registrar and hosting service, writes “the ramifications of this are no less than chilling and every single organization branded or operating under .com, .net, .org, .biz etc needs to ask themselves about their vulnerability to the whims of US federal and state lawmakers.”

As a result, there are demands worldwide for the DNS to be placed under the auspices of an international organization such as the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), a specialized agency of the United Nations. The Geneva-based ITU allocates global radio spectrum and satellite orbits and promotes the development of technical standards in the information and communication technologies.

In 2005, a U.N. working group concluded that "no single Government should have a pre-eminent role in relation to international internet governance."

But, as Tim Wu, a Columbia University law professor, said in 2005, "as long as the root [the master-file of permitted TLDs] is controlled by the United States, there's this psychological feeling that the United States owns the internet."

Current developments seem to have proven Professor Wu's point.

(c) Picture: freedigitalphotos.net

New Hire and Re-hire Reporting – A Reminder

You plan on hiring a new employee? Great! Here is something you should keep in mind and do:

According to a 1996 federal law called the "Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act"(PRWORA), employers in all 50 US-states are required to report all their new hires and re-hires to a state directory. Generally, the following information is required:

• Employer Federal Employer Identification Number (FEIN);
• Employer Name;
• Employer Address;
• Employee Social Security Number;
  
• Employee Name;
• Employee Address; and
• Employee Date of Hire

In some states, further information such as the employee's date of birth is also required. Four states, Georgia, Iowa, Maryland, and Mississippi, now also require information on the availability of health insurance. North Carolina does not require employers to report on issues of health insurance.

State-by-State reporting requirements can be found at the U.S. Small Business Administration website.

(c) Picture: freedigitalphotos.net

Decision on Utah's Immigration Law Postponed

We previously reported on our Blog about the Utah immigration law known as House Bill 497. The law allows police to check the citizenship status of anyone they arrest.

U.S. District Court Judge Clark Waddoups, who is presiding over the hearing as to the law's constitutionality, postponed his decision. He wrote in his two page order on February 21, 2012:

“[s]hortly, the Supreme Court is expected to issue a decision on another immigration-related law from Arizona. Although Arizona’s law is different from Utah’s law in several respects, some aspects are sufficiently similar that the Supreme Court’s ruling likely will inform this court in its decision. Because this case addresses significant constitutional issues, the court does not believe it would be helpful to the parties for the court to rule on the present motions before it receives the additional guidance from the Supreme Court. It therefore will reserve ruling until the Supreme Court has issued its decision.”

We will inform you about further developments on this issue. In the meantime, please check out the latest developments in the Arizona immigration law debate.

(c) Picture: www.50states.com

Georgia Immigration Bill "SB 458" Targets Education

Last May, we reported on our Blog about Georgia's immigration law House Bill 87. The state now seems to want to take things a step further with Senate Bill 458 ("SB 458").

State Senator Barry Loudermilk (R-Cassville), the sponsor of SB 458, is saying that college spots are being taken away from Americans and legal immigrants by illegal/undocumented immigrants – people who, on any account, would not be allowed to work legally in the U.S. after graduation. The bill would prohibit public institutions of higher education from enrolling undocumented persons.

Currently, there are 318,000 students enrolled in the University System of Georgia. About 300 of those students are undocumented; that is 0.094% of all students enrolled. Last year, the number was a staggering 500.

Hank Huckaby, the chancellor of the University System, argues that the current situation does not need to be changed and points out that undocumented students are charged out-of-state tuition, which is three-times higher than in-state tuition. In-state tuition is supported by tax dollars.

In contrast, Senator Loudermilk believes that attending a public university is a privilege only to be granted to citizens and legal immigrants. He also thinks that the current University System is in violation of federal law.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement say federal law does not forbid undocumented immigrants from attending public universities, but that States can decide for themselves on the matter.

A proposal by President Obama might change that. "Many were brought here as small children, are American through and through, yet they live every day with the threat of deportation," Obama recently said. "Others came more recently, to study business and science and engineering, but as soon as they get their degree, we send them home to invent new products and create new jobs somewhere else.”

Noting that "[t]hat doesn’t make sense," President Obama is championing a route to permanent residency and citizenship for illegal immigrants who came to the U.S. as minors and “earned” their right to stay, e.g. through military service and higher education. Opponents of the bill believe that it encourages and rewards undocumented immigration.

(c) Picture: 50states.com

Yahoo Springs Threat of Lawsuit on Facebook

Yahoo has been around since 1994 and was once one of the most dominant internet companies. Lately, it's star has been sinking, while those of firms such as Google and Facebook are rising quickly. It's a common scene in the IT industry.

But Yahoo still has a couple of cards up its sleeve, notably its patent portfolio. We've been seeing a bunch of patent spats between tech giants lately, be it Samsung vs Apple or everybody against Google and other Android manufacturers. The latest is a patent infringement claim by Yahoo against Facebook.

Yahoo claims that Facebook is infringing on 10 to 20 of its patents and is threatening to sue Facebook if a licensing agreement isn't reached. For Facebook, the threat couldn't come at a worse time, seeing how the company is preparing for its much-anticipated IPO.

The move by Yahoo is all the more surprising following the friendly relations the companies had been pursuing. While it may provide a windfall for Yahoo's investors, in the long-run Yahoo needs to innovate.

In Silicon Valley, you either innovate or die. Patent trolling is not the solution....

(c) Picture: freedigitalphotos.net

Carolinas and Neighboring States Poised to Profit from the Offshore Wind Industry

The Charlotte Business Journal reports that while significant offshore wind projects along the Atlantic are still years away, the Carolinas in particular have been building a strong supply chain for the land-based wind power industry over the past years. This supply chain should give them a heads-up when offshore wind takes off.

Wind industry companies with a presence in North Carolina include Nucor Corp., PPG Industries Inc., Duke Energy Renewables, and the ABB Group. The China Ming Yang Power Group, a leading wind turbine manufacturer in China that is publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange, just opened an R&D center for offshore wind turbines on the Centennial Campus of North Carolina State University in Raleigh. Locating their R&D center in North Carolina was a natural choice.

According to information provided by the North Carolina Offshore Wind Coalition, North Carolina has the largest offshore wind resource amongst all East Coast states with an impressive 140 GW. South Carolina comes second with 96 GW of offshore wind resource. North Carolina also

• “[i]s estimated to be the least expensive state in the nation for new offshore wind, driven largely by the state's highly competitive and flexible labor markets.”

• “[h]as one of the largest electricity markets on the East Coast, using 91% as much electricity as the state of New York.”
• “[h]as ideal port facilities with deep draft, area for expansion, no overhead or lateral restrictions, and about 3 miles to open ocean.”

Jim Lanard, president of the Washington-based Offshore Wind Development Coalition, noted at the Southeastern Coastal Wind Conference in Charlotte last week that the regional effort by Southeastern states is a smart move and a lot more efficient than having individual states compete amongst themselves. North Carolina Commerce Secretary Keith Crisco agreed and suggested that the Carolinas, Virginia, and Georgia pool resources and share revenue.

Let's hope these excellent plans don't turn out to be nothing but hot air.

(c) Picture: Wikipedia

Kola-Getränke könnten krebserregend sein

Kola ist nicht gesund, das ist allseits bekannt. Das Kola jedoch so ungesund ist, war bislang nicht bekannt...

Ein Zusatz in Kola-Getränken, Zuckercouleur (E 150 a – d), kann nach Art der Herstellung Anteile von 4-Methylimidazol enthalten, ein unerwünschtes Nebenprodukt, das in Verdacht steht, krebserregend zu sein. E 150 d wird in Deutschland beispielsweise für die dunkle Farbe von Coca-Cola verwendet.

Der amerikanische Bundesstaat Kalifornien hat 4-Methylimidazol in eine Liste krebserregender Stoffe aufgenommen. Daraufhin haben Pepsi und Coca-Cola ihre Rezepte für die gesamte USA angepasst. Denn wäre der Stoff in einer bestimmten Menge in ihren Getränken nachzuweisen, hätten diese den Warnhinweis „krebserregend“ tragen müssen.

In Deutschland werden die Rezepte nicht angepasst. In Deutschland, wie auch auf Bundesebene in den USA, wird der Stoff, der bei der Bräunung von Zuckern und Eiweißen (die sog. Maillard-Reaktion) entsteht und daher auch in anderen Lebensmitteln nachzuweisen ist, als unbedenklich eingestuft. Erst beim Konsumieren von 1000 Cola-Dosen am Tag würde ein Mensch die Dosis an 4-Methylimidazol aufnehmen, die bei Versuchen an Nagetieren Krebs auslöst.

Also, wie so oft im Leben: genießen in Maßen.

(c) Picture: freedigitalphotos.net

International Trade and Business Symposium in Charlotte on March 22, 2012

The Managing Partner of the BridgehouseLaw Charlotte office Reinhard von Hennigs, will be presenting on employment-based immigration and visas & green cards for foreign investors on March 22, 2012, at the International Trade and Business Symposium in Charlotte, NC.

The symposium will address business development topics for foreign businesses coming to the USA and for American companies wanting to expand or do business abroad. This event is being organized by the Russian-American Business Council of NC & the Swedish-American Chamber of Commerce of Carolinas in conjunction with the German Language & Culture Foundation and the Federal Republic of Germany.

The 3 target countries are Germany, Sweden and the Russian Federation. You will hear from industry experts, both private & public sector, in business development, legal, logistics, taxation & accounting, real estate and insurance address the issues that companies and individuals need to know if they want to succeed globally.

For more information and registration, please click here.

(c) Picture: freeditigalphotos.net

Laissez-faire, where art thou?

The Economist has an excellent piece on over-regulation in America. Traditionally, the United States has been marked by its adherence to laissez-faire, the principle in which the state does not meddle in transactions between private parties. As of late, however, the United States seems to be taking the opposite path. Indeed,

“[a] Florida law requires vending-machine labels to urge the public to file a report if the label is not there. The Federal Railroad Administration insists that all trains must be painted with an 'F' at the front, so you can tell which end is which. Bureaucratic busybodies in Bethesda, Maryland, have shut down children’s lemonade stands because the enterprising young moppets did not have trading licences,”

as the Economist quips.

Unfortunately, over-regulation does not limit itself to such laughable issues. The Dodd-Frank law of 2010, designed to prevent another financial crisis by putting an end to “too big to fail,” to abusive financial practices and to excessive risk-taking, has been suffocated by its complexity – complexity that is still increasing. The Economist notes that,

“[a]t 848 pages, it is 23 times longer than Glass-Steagall, the reform that followed the Wall Street crash of 1929. Worse, every other page demands that regulators fill in further detail. Some of these clarifications are hundreds of pages long. Just one bit, the 'Volcker rule', which aims to curb risky proprietary trading by banks, includes 383 questions that break down into 1,420 subquestions.”

Likewise, “ObamaCare” hasn't succeeded in reducing the amount of paperwork health providers must wade through: per hour of patient treatment at least 30 minutes of paperwork and often enough a whole hour. Do we really need “nine codes relating to injuries caused by parrots, and three relating to burns from flaming water-skis?”

The author suggests a number of remedies to over-regulation. Sunset clauses, less hubris in the belief that all eventualities can be regulated, less lobbying. It remains to hope that some legislators take note. After all,

“[C]omplexity costs money. [...] A study for the Small Business Administration, a government body, found that regulations in general add $10,585 in costs per employee. It’s a wonder the jobless rate isn’t even higher than it is.”

(c) Picture: flickr

USCIS vereinfacht Übermittlung von Informationen im sog. VIBE System

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) hat im Dezember 2011 das webbasierte Validation Instrument for Business Enterprises (VIBE) aktualisiert. Im Rahmen von VIBE greift USCIS auf die Datenbank eines kommerziellen Anbieters zurück, um Informationen über Unternehmen, die Arbeitnehmer für Visen sponsern, zu verifizieren. Dieser Anbieter ist gegenwärtig Dun & Bradstreet (D&B).

Obgleich USCIS explizit erklärt, dass eine Anmeldung bei D&B nicht erforderlich sei, ist es unsere Erfahrung, dass eine Anmeldung oft zu weniger Rückfragen von USCIS führt und dadurch die Visumsbearbeitung beschleunigen kann.

Falls Sie sich für eine Anmeldung bei D&B entscheiden, hier ein paar wichtige Infos vorab:

• Die Anmeldung ist kostenlos. Gegebenenfalls werden kostenpflichtige Produkte oder Dienstleistungen angeboten, diese müssen jedoch im Rahmen des VIBE-Programms nicht bezogen werden.
  
  
• Bei Anmeldung erhält Ihr Unternehmen eine sog. DUNS Identifikationsnummer. Diese Nummer erhalten Sie in der Regel innerhalb 30 Tagen.
  
  
• Updates zu schon eingetragenen Informationen werden in der Regel innerhalb 2 bis 7 Werktagen nach Verifikation eingepflegt.
  
  
• Wenn Sie für die Anmeldung die Seite http://fedgov.dnb.com/webform verwenden, werden Sie von D&B keine Marketingschreiben bekommen, bei einer Anmeldung über die Haupseite http://www.dnb.com, unter Umständen schon.
  
  
• Bei der Anmeldung ist die private Anschrift einer Kontaktperson bei dem anzumeldenden Unternehmen anzugeben. Über diese Anschrift wird verifiziert, dass man berechtigt ist, eine DUNS Nummer für das Unternehmen zu beantragen. Diese Person kann zudem Informationen über das Unternehmen bearbeiten. Kann diese Person anhand öffentlicher Datenbanken von D&B nicht verifiziert werden, z.B. weil die Kontaktperson erst kürzlich in die USA eingereist ist, kann eine Anmeldung vorerst nicht über das Webformular stattfinden, sondern muss auf einem von D&B zur Verfügung gestellten Formular erfolgen.
  

Für Rückfragen bzgl. der Anmeldung bei D&B oder andere Immigration Law Fragen, kontaktieren Sie gerne unser Charlotte Büro.

(c) Picture: D&B