IN THIS GUIDE · A plant manager whose qualifying year abroad was interrupted by a secondment
Start with the L-1A eligibility and application overview
Continuity is measured against the petitioning group, not against a career
The requirement is not one year of relevant experience. It is one continuous year of employment with the qualifying organisation abroad, falling within the three years immediately before the petition is filed. Thierry's twelve years in the industry count for nothing here unless a full unbroken year of them was worked for the group inside that three-year window. Where a secondment placed him on another company's payroll, the months are unlikely to count, and the analysis turns on which employer had the employment relationship rather than on where he physically sat. This is one of the few L-1 questions that can be answered definitively from payroll records and a chart of dates, which is why it should be answered first, before the more arguable questions about managerial duties are opened.
What managerial capacity has to look like in a plant
L-1A requires that the position be primarily managerial or executive, and a plant is where that test is hardest, because good plant managers are hands-on. The evidence that carries weight is specific: the names and job titles of the people who report to Thierry, whether those subordinates are themselves professionals or supervisors, his authority to hire, fire and set schedules, and the discretion he exercises over an essential function of the business. Time spent personally operating a saw line or expediting a shipment counts against the description rather than for it. A petition that describes the job as overseeing operations without naming a single subordinate leaves the adjudicator to assume the worst, and the request for evidence that follows costs more time than drafting it properly would have.
The seven-year ceiling is a planning fact, not a formality
L-1A status is limited to a maximum of seven years, and time already spent in L status counts toward it. That ceiling shapes decisions made now. If the American subsidiary expects Thierry to remain indefinitely, the family should understand at the outset that L-1A ends, that E-2 carries no direct path to permanent residence either, and that any immigrant route runs on its own timetable and should be started years before the ceiling is reached rather than in its final months. Where he has held L status previously, the earlier period must be counted honestly. Time spent physically outside the United States during an L assignment can sometimes be recaptured, but that is a question for counsel with the travel records in front of them, not an assumption to build a relocation on.
Both companies must be doing business, and the phrase has a meaning
A qualifying relationship of parent, branch, subsidiary or affiliate is only half of the corporate requirement. Both entities must also be doing business, which means the regular, systematic and continuous provision of goods or services, not merely the existence of an office, a registration or a bank account. Here that is satisfied on both sides, and the petition should say so with evidence rather than assertion: filed returns, customer invoices, payroll summaries and premises for each company. The point matters most when a group is restructuring. If the Wickham company were wound down after Thierry left, the American entity would lose the foreign employer that supports his status, which is a risk worth naming in the plan before it arrives as a surprise at extension.
Sources reviewed 2026-09-07. This guide covers a preparation focus; it is not an individual eligibility assessment.
- USCIS: L-1A intracompany transferee executive or manager
- USCIS Policy Manual, Volume 2 Part L: intracompany transferees
- USCIS: L classification documentation and evidence
- eCFR: 8 CFR 214.2(l), intracompany transferees
- Department of State: 9 FAM 402.12, intracompany transferees
- USCIS: Form G-1055, fee schedule