Read it.
Use it.
Focused guides for the questions that need more than a quick answer. Each includes a worksheet to prepare your next conversation.
Guides for your next decision.
Build a TN employer evidence brief before drafting the letter
Read & prepare Applicant planningKeep an L-1A new-office record from approval to extension
Read & prepare Applicant planningCompare the E-2 evidence for a startup and a business purchase
Read & prepare U.S. destination planningCanadian RN planning for New York State
Read & prepare U.S. destination planningCanadian RN planning for California
Read & prepareSeven decisions, answered before you prepare.
When the credential, not the job title, decides the TN listing
The document that most often decides a TN case is the credential, because each Appendix 2 profession states its own degree, licence or experience rule and the applicant either meets it or does not. Before an employer drafts a letter, identify which listing the duties fit, read that listing's rule, and locate the original record that satisfies it. Only then write the letter to describe the job under that listing. The next decision is whether the records prove the proposed duties, not merely whether the applicant has impressive experience. Keep the chosen listing, credential rule, and duty comparison together so the employer can correct a mismatch before the file reaches an officer.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Read the two listings the job could fit
- Assemble the credential before the letter
- Resolve differences among the papers before the port of entry
A permanent-resident card opens Canada, not the U.S. routes that require citizenship
Canadian citizenship and Canadian permanent residence are different facts with different consequences under U.S. immigration law. TN requires Canadian or Mexican citizenship; E-2 requires treaty nationality of the investor's own country of citizenship. A permanent resident of Canada is assessed on the passport they actually hold. Households with mixed status need each person's route worked out from their own citizenship, not from the family's address. The concrete decision is whether the household should wait for a citizenship result, use a route based on the present passport, or preserve Canadian residence while another application proceeds. Those choices belong on one calendar because an expected future status is not evidence today.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Record each person's actual status today
- Test each route against the person's own nationality
- Keep the Canadian-side consequences on the same calendar
A minority stake with an escrow that unwinds is not yet an E-2 investment
Two terms in a purchase agreement decide most E-2 outcomes before any consular officer reads them: the ownership percentage and decision rights, which govern whether the investor develops and directs the enterprise, and the escrow or refund conditions, which govern whether the money is irrevocably committed. An East Hants buyer should read those clauses for immigration purposes before the commercial negotiation closes them. A buyer therefore needs to decide which commercial terms can be signed now without leaving the funds revocable or the investor powerless. Put that decision ahead of a price negotiation, because a later amendment may alter the immigration analysis.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Count control, not just the percentage
- Find the clause that returns the money
- Show the enterprise as a business, not a price
A new U.S. depot gets one year to become the business the petition described
A new-office L-1 petition is approved for one year on the strength of secured premises, the Canadian company's ability to fund the start-up, and a plan showing the transferred manager will be supported by a real operation within that year. The extension is decided on what actually happened. An East Hants company should build the first-year record from the day the lease is signed, not the month before the extension is due.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Lease the premises and prove the parent can carry them
- Keep a dated file of everything the plan promised
- Build the extension on managerial evidence that now exists
Transfer yourself through the company, or invest personally: an owner-manager's two different files
An owner who runs a Canadian company can reach a U.S. business in two legally different ways. Through L-1A, the Canadian company establishes or acquires a related U.S. entity and transfers the owner as its manager. Through E-2, the owner personally invests in and directs a U.S. enterprise. The entities, the money, the duties and the long-term consequences differ, and the facts that qualify one may disqualify the other. The decision must be made before shares are issued or money is transferred. A share certificate, bank trail, and job description should tell the same story, because changing the story after closing can leave neither route supported.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Draw who owns what under each option
- Describe her actual U.S. work under each option
- Compare where each route leaves the household in five years
One transfer, three separate answers: the transferee, the paramedic spouse, and the son who turns 21
A family move is several immigration files that happen to share an address. The principal's status sets the framework, but each family member's rights — to work, to study, to remain past a birthday — come from their own dependant status and their own facts. Work each person out separately before the household commits to a date, a school or a job.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- The spouse's right to work follows the principal's category
- The child's file has a clock in it
- Each person's plan needs its own document set
Money you expect back versus money you give away: EB-5 and the Gold Card for a liquid investor
EB-5 places at-risk capital in a job-creating enterprise and may return it; the Gold Card, as officially described, is a nonrefundable fee plus a gift to the United States within a vetting process, with no commercial enterprise and no return. They are different financial acts leading toward permanent residence through different classifications. Compare what the money is meant to do before comparing amounts.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Ask whether you want the money working or gone
- Count the family and the conditions for each route
- Do the financial and the immigration diligence separately