WORKING YOUR WAY AROUND THE WORLD - USA VISAS
Carolyn Boyd, TNT Magazine, March 25, 2002

A few centuries ago, it wasn't too difficult to get settled in the US. People would board ships, head across the Atlantic and, if they didn't succumb to scurvy, enjoy their new life and American dream. Unfortunately, things aren't so easy nowadays and there's a sea of red tape awaiting anyone wishing to head Stateside.

If you're lucky enough to work for a company with connections in the States, sponsorship is a great way to get your foot in the door. However, if you're not working for such a company and have set your sights on a longer stay or perhaps a permanent move, things get complicated.

There's no easy way to get the famous green card - the permit to permanently live, work and study in the US - so the option open to most nationalities is the Green Card Lottery. Each year, the US issues 50,000 green cards to applicants randomly selected in a lottery process. It was established as part of the 1996 Immigration Act in order to provide opportunities to countries other than the main sources of immigration to the States.

Mandy Jacob, from Cape Town, now lives in California and is one of the lucky ones to have been selected. While travelling in the States between doing her masters degree in South Africa and another in Britain, she decided she wanted to stay. "I went to see a lawyer and she said she couldn't help because I was a student, but she said there is this Green Card Lottery," says Mandy. "This was seven years ago and so it only cost US$20.

I entered it, and then went to England and did my masters. Then in between all this, I kept getting these papers saying 'you're one of 10 million' ... 'you're one of five million...' and finally I got one that said, 'you won the green card'." By then, Mandy was working for General Electric which then transferred her to the States.

Shortly afterwards, she decided to set up a company to help other people make the move to the US to set up a business. "I realised it was such a niche market - in the whole of the US, I've found two direct competitors," she says. "In the UK you've got a dime a dozen doing the same thing. "When the people come over, all they have to pay for is their visa and once you start becoming profitable, we pick 15% profit. I wanted to target the UK market because these are people from 25 to 35 with all the ideas, but not the capital. Small companies are the best."

As well as helping people set themselves up with small businesses, Mandy is also keen to prevent people being ripped off by scam artists who offer help to immigrants. "The hardest part about the scam artists is half of them are Australians, New Zealanders or South Africans and you think 'they've been in the same position as me'," she says. "They take full advantage as they know that you don't know the system, then pack up and move to the next state.

"My husband came over here and he didn't have a job, so we went to a recruiter, paid him $5000 and we've never seen that money and he's never seen a job through them."