The petition carries the Form I-129 filing fee, the fraud prevention and detection fee and the asylum program fee, all listed on Form G-1055, with premium processing optional. The customer contract may shift some costs, but the petitioner remains responsible for the filing.
Read the schedule, then decide who pays
Check Form G-1055 on the day the petition is prepared; do not rely on the amounts in an earlier petition, and note that fee levels can depend on the employer’s size and status. Premium processing is a separate optional fee that buys a faster adjudication clock, not a better outcome. Beyond USCIS charges, the real expenses are preparation: assembling the procedure histories, drafting the services agreement so control is clear, and obtaining certified translations of any French-language manuals.
If the customer is paying the subsidiary a licence fee, the contract can allocate the specialist’s travel and living costs, but immigration fees should be paid by the petitioner as the employer. Budget as well for an L-2 application for the spouse and for whatever state licensing she pursues, and for an extension petition if the assignment runs past the initial approval. A first review separates petition charges from technical evidence costs, travel, translations, and the commercial expense of supporting the assignment.
Hypothetical example: a radio-frequency shielding equipment producer must export protected test reports from an archived system before filing. The archive-retrieval invoice is not a government fee, yet it may be the expense that makes the specialized-knowledge proof usable. Decide early who will fund it and retain the underlying technical records, not only a consultant summary.