How long does USCIS take to respond to an RFE? Timelines by form type
10 mins read | Apr 28, 2026
TUKKI’S CHOICE OF BUSINESS MODELS TO IMPROVE THE US IMMIGRATION EXPERIENCE.
Contributor
Ramiro Roballos
Reading time
3 mins read
Date published
Aug 9, 2024
I'm still convinced that execution is more important than strategy. However, some strategic decisions can make or break your business.
One key decision is choosing the industry you want to enter. Many years ago at Kellogg, I read a statistic that stuck with me: 50% of a business's success depends on the industry you choose.
The next crucial decision is your business plan and positioning. Even though our team at Tukki chose to work in immigration, we could have gone in different directions, like selling software to lawyers or automating the immigration process to replace lawyers. Each option would lead to very different business models, clients, company types, required skills, and economic implications.
I’m asked a lot why we chose to work with lawyers instead of running other business model options. I’ll answer that in this article.
To make a significant impact in the industry, we need to address the biggest pain points, which do not lie with the lawyers, but with the immigrants.
After interviewing dozens of lawyers and immigrants, it became clear that immigrants face the most challenges: inefficient processes, lack of visibility, slow responses, stress, and uncertainty. While lawyers could benefit from better technology, we believed we could make a bigger impact by working directly with immigrants.
Additionally, we think that the pain points that immigrants currently experienced can't be solved by software alone. It requires a combination of software and operations. Great lawyers are part of the operations piece, but bringing in business best practices from other industries makes a huge difference for the immigration experience and ease of process for lawyers.
Involving immigration lawyers from the start is essential to providing the best service to immigrants — we’ve learned this from personal experience. Immigration law is complex and rarely clear-cut. You need the expertise and judgment of an experienced lawyer. While many steps in the process can be automated, there are moments where a lawyer's input is crucial, such as:
Additionally, obtaining a visa or a green card is a life-changing event; immigrants want a team they can rely on, someone to chat with and answer their questions. Our vision of the best immigration experience is the opposite of a self-service, impersonal experience with an AI. We believe in providing a warm, supportive environment with real human interaction.
People often ask, "If you still have lawyers on your team, why should I work with Tukki instead of going directly to a lawyer?"
We combine the best of both worlds: expert knowledge from lawyers and a highly efficient, customer-focused process enabled by our technology.
Neither can deliver the best experience to immigrants alone; you need both.
I admit, this approach didn't come without its challenges! It’s far more complicated to acquire customers, service them, get great lawyers, manage operations end-to-end, and build a great product than just focus on one section of the journey. Scaling is also much easier when you're building a B2B SaaS solution compared to managing operations. That's why, since day one, Tukki has obsessively focused on streamlining operations with technology to become exponentially more efficient and scalable than the status quo.
If you want to truly reinvent an industry, you need to go all in, and that's what we signed up for.
To tap into that expert knowledge from lawyers and efficient, customer-focused process enabled by our technology, start with our Visa Match tool, and find out what your best options for US immigration are.
WE CAN HELP
Need more clarity?
Find quick answers to frequent visa questions from our legal experts
Can an L-1A visa holder start their own business in the U.S.?
The L-1A is tied to employer sponsorship by a qualifying multinational organization.
The beneficiary can't use it to launch an independent venture.
However, if you own a company abroad and open a U.S. branch or subsidiary, you may be able to petition yourself as an L-1A intracompany transferee, provided all eligibility requirements are met.
Is it wise to apply for a B-1 or B-2 business visa if you hold a C-Corporation or LLC?
Holding a C-Corp or any type of business entity technically holds no implications over your legal B-1 or B-2 eligibility, but can raise questions from immigration officials in some circumstances.
You could own multiple companies in the US and that generally shouldn’t affect how you apply for this visa if you’re eligible.
How long does it take to get approved for EB-1A vs O-1A?
Both O-1A and EB-1A petitions can use premium processing for $2,805 ($2,965 since March 2026), which guarantees USCIS action within 15 business days.
Without premium processing, O-1A petitions and EB-1A I-140 petitions are generally processed on similar timelines. The key difference is that EB-1A approval is only the first step toward permanent residence.
After I-140 approval, EB-1A applicants must still complete adjustment of status or consular processing, which adds several additional months to the overall green card timeline.
Can I change employers on an O-1A visa?
Yes, but your new employer must file a new Form I-129 petition with USCIS before you start working for them. You can't simply switch jobs the way you might as a lawful permanent resident.
If you were sponsored through a U.S. agent, you may have more flexibility since the agent structure is designed to allow work with multiple entities.
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