The government charges are the USCIS petition filing fee and any additional statutory fees that apply to the petitioner, with premium processing optional; current amounts are published in the USCIS fee schedule. Legal fees and document gathering usually exceed the filing fees.
Budget the evidence-building, because that is where the effort goes
Employers reliably underestimate the internal cost of an L-1 petition and overestimate the filing fee. Confirm the fee amounts on the current USCIS fee schedule, since they are revised and secondhand figures go stale quickly. Then budget the real work: assembling corporate and financial records for two entities, reconstructing a payroll history, drafting duty descriptions that survive scrutiny, and preparing an organizational chart. That work sits with the finance and human resources people who are already busy, and it is the reason petitions slip. Premium processing buys a faster adjudication, not a faster file. A useful rule is to assign one internal owner with authority to collect documents, because a petition assembled by committee is the one that misses its date.
Hypothetical example: a fermentation-equipment maker assumes premium processing solves its transfer budget. The review should decide which internal and external costs the company must assign, using a cost schedule, assignment letter, document-owner list, and current fee source. Put the payer, payment date, and refund condition beside every item before money moves. Check current government figures directly. The recurring error is that faster adjudication does not gather payroll or prove ownership. Financial planning follows the substantive eligibility analysis.
Confirm the responsible person and deadline before company records become unavailable.