Category: Visas

The Office of Academic Personnel (OAP), in collaboration with the Office of Sponsored Programs (OSP), is pleased to announce some important changes to the H and J Visa Request Forms. Most importantly, the H Visa Request Form will be moved to a new tool at 5pm on Friday, July 31, in the same way the J Visa Request Form was updated on June 1. The H and J Intake Forms will be updated accordingly.

As part of this update, units will no longer need to create separate Deemed Export Compliance Attestations (DECAs); instead, DECA information from the new H Visa Request Form will be sent directly to OSP for immediate review. To facilitate this process, OAP has added several fields to the H Visa Intake and Visa Request Forms: purpose of stay, faculty supervisor, and grants/contracts being used for funding. If additional information is needed, you will be contacted by OSP. 

OAP is also adding “save as draft” functionality to both the J and the H Visa Request Forms. “Save as draft” will save everything except attachments; drafts will be saved for 90 days.

Here are a few other highlights:

• Standardized country list: Country of birth, countries of citizenship, and country of residence will now all be required and will be selectable from a list of countries recognized by the U.S. government. This will reduce back-and-forth needed with the ISO team.
• The display of “print views” used for conditional approvals will be more legible
• The J Visa Request Form will now allow export compliance review by OSP.

Please feel free to contact ISO with any questions or feedback you have about the new forms.

The Office of Academic Personnel (OAP) is pleased to announce that we’ve built an enhanced J visa request form, which is more user-friendly and allows for more efficient review. This form is live as of June 1, 2020. Here are a few of the highlights!

• Ability to see summary information about previous requests including request number, scholar name, start date, and request status
• More intuitive user interface
  • Appointment information now comes prior to funding information (sections 3 and 4 swapped)
  • Navigation links so you can navigate up and down through the request
  • Request numbers are standardized to always use the Request Tracker (RT)/ticket number, even for invoices
• Better data validation, which should highlight common issues prior to OAP review
  • Checks for “short-term scholar” category only used for visits up to 6 months
  • Title-specific reminders based on title selected, such as information about the maximum appointment length
  • Warnings related to start dates, funding and salary minimums
  • Ability to submit documentation for scholars with previous U.S. visits
• Better behind-the-scenes tools for OAP
• Better invoicing
  • Invoices will be generated and sent out more quickly
  • Invoice file names will include the scholar’s name and request number
  • Versioned invoices will be used to track corrections, e.g. when budget information changes
  • Invoice numbers in MyFinancial.desktop (MyFD) will correspond to the Request Tracker (RT)/ticket number with line numbers and descriptions for each charge

This initiative is part of OAP’s strategic priority 3:“Get ‘Leaner’ on at least one complex process per year.” OAP reviewed common issues from past J visa requests to identify form improvements.

Thanks very much to ABC Shared Services and the College of Arts and Sciences Shared Services for providing feedback and identifying important user interface improvements.

The H visa request form is next in line for review and enhancement.

The new J-1 Visa Request form and the updated  J Visa Intake Form are now available. If you have any questions or issues with the new form, please contact acadvisa@uw.edu.

J-1 exchange visitors (and any J-2 dependents) who were in the United States during 2019 must file paperwork with the IRS even if they had no U.S. income or were covered by a tax treaty, and even if they are no longer in the country.

Please inform the exchange visitors in your department that they may use GLACIER Tax Prep, a free, secure web-based program that prepares the appropriate forms and provides step-by-step instructions and assistance for foreign nationals who are nonresidents for tax purposes. GLACIER Tax Prep is available through International Student Services on their Tax Information page, and will remain available through at least July of this year to reflect delayed tax filing deadlines. GLACIER can be accessed without an active UW NetID.

Please note that according to the Department of State, J-1 exchange visitors who do not meet the IRS definition of “resident alien” are not eligible to receive the $1,200 Recovery Rebates distributed by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) as part of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act.

ISO staff do not give tax advice and are unable to answer even basic tax questions. J-1 exchange visitors can contact the IRS for further information, or use a private tax preparation service if they so choose. The IRS maintains a specific page for J-1 exchange visitors.