When you say you're an international student, do you mean you're in the US on an F-1 visa? If yes, you might be in violation of your visa terms. If you have not researched this, please start reading at http://www.justanswer.com/immigration-law/330cd-holding-f-1-...
Wow, that's just...mind-numbingly awful. If that's true, the Emmanuel just forfeits all that money?
I suspect that a good lawyer will be able to recover most of it for him, especially since his presence in the US was not material to the earning of that income.
What part is mind-numbingly awful? It's pretty standard for countries to give out student visas with the proviso that the student cannot accept employment, or can only work up to (say) 15~20 hours a week after getting a special permit.
As far as visa regulations in developed countries go, this one sounds fairly reasonable to me.
> I suspect that a good lawyer will be able to recover most of it for him, especially since his presence in the US was not material to the earning of that income.
I'd be very surprised if this argument were accepted, given that presumably a lot of OP's income came from US sources (if OP was temporarily in the US, AND was being paid from non-US sources, AND the total sum was not as high as 200 grand, then arguably the case would be in a gray area [1]). Otherwise, it would be too easy to enter the US on a tourist visa and work from home, coding or teaching $foo via Skype, but good luck explaining that to the immigration authorities on entry.
However, it's not clear whether OP was actually in the US when they were selling the licenses.
IANAL (which is why the OP should definitely talk to one).
If the work that generated the income was done while he was physically in the US, then the immigration folks will definitely have an opinion on if it was legal under his visa terms. This may or may not have an impact on any potential legal remedies that are available wrt Paypal.
Yeah, as someone who has held an F1 in the past, the US authorities take a very dim view of getting income while you are here without authorization. I think actually committing misdemeanor crime is of less consequence to your legal status than taking money. We were warned about it very specifically.
I heard of someone who was deported because he was painting fences for some disposable income. My guess is that the OP actually needs an immigration lawyer, not a civil claims lawyer (or whatever they are called).
It's a sticky situation, and likely depends on whether the money was being posted to a PayPal account with a US or Venezuelan address/bank account, and whether he actually performed any work on turn.js while in the US. My guess is that if PayPal are asking for the SSN, he tied it to the USA, which is going to be a problem.
I'm working legally in the US (TN-1), but my wife is here without permission to work (TD-1) (and is not working). When I discussed her options with my immigration lawyer, like maybe should could remote-work for a company back home, my lawyer said (informally) that any work or any income, while in the US, was subject to immigration law. In fact, I was told US immigration's opinion is that when non-US citizens answer work email while on vacation in Hawai'i, it's technically illegal (although obviously everyone happily ignores that in practice).
What a surprise, countries are really no-fooling serious about protecting jobs for their own citizens.
So it's quite possible that in this case, Paypal had no legal alternative.
The other night there was something on CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corp) about a Canadian guy visiting his wife/girlfriend in the US.
US Customs took his aside and was't going to let him pass (no surprise) but let him through but told him he could pass but he couldn't work in the US not even housework, not a joke.
AFAIK you can't work for US employer or perform services for US employer. Not sure that this covers outside of country services/work.
This is meant to protect US jobs which you didn't take and that is a bottom line.
IANAL either, but there's no law against making income, there's a alw against accepting employment. If OP can show he created and sold his own product then that should not violate his visa constraints in any way. In any case, I've never heard of anyone having their income confiscated even if they were a candidate for deportation (though not a lawyer I follow immigration law very closely, it's a pet issue of mine).
Even in the years after the first, the "jobs" have to be related to your course work ergo "practical training" i.e. internships with some company.
There is no allowance for running your own business anywhere at anytime. I maybe wrong if laws have changed.
Please point to something that says it's ok to run a business. Thanks.
The (possible) immigration issue and the Paypal-locked-my-account issue are somewhat tangential. The money's (probably) not being held because of a visa issue. It's being held because it looks suspicious.
BUT, let's say OP gets a lawyer and starts exchanging nasty letters with Paypal. Any Paypal lawyer worth his salt is going to quickly say "Hmm, you're a student? Does your visa situation allow you to earn money in the US, or was this income generated illegally? Let's ask USCIS for their expert opinions. By the way, you do realize they can deport you, right? Are you SURE you want to continue down this road?"
I agree entirely that they're almost certainly tangential. I generally agree with the line of your argument.
But you're being nasty about Paypal, and I very much doubt the implication. I'll bet you 10:1 that Paypal would rather give him his money. But they also want to be in compliance with the law. They also want to spend the least they can on policy-vio detection and fraud detection ("least they can" means "a hell of a lot", say my professional connections; they're serious about fraud), and the least they can on customer service, and have minimal PR consequences.
It's not like they get to keep the money if they decide it's not legal to move it; they have to give it back, or pass it on. They'd rather pass it on and have more future business, from which they can take their cut. But they won't flagrantly break the law to do it, and they can't spend infinite resources making sure the right thing happens in every single case.
PayPal doesn't give a shit about claiming the money for the government and they damn sure don't care about his immigration status. They just don't want to get ripped off.
As I said, if lawyers get involved Paypal will care very much about his immigration status. If his visa doesn't allow making money while in the US, he's just handed Paypal's counsel a very big stick with which to make him go away.
I was an F-1 student too, and here's my suggestion:
This coming Summer, apply for pre-completion OPT.
You are allowed to start a company (register a corporation), and work for it under OPT status. I have inquired about this on HN before: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1523021 I also verified with the DSOs (Designated School Officials) at my university, who are authorized to give legal advice on this matter, and they said that it was indeed possible to be self-employed / do a startup while on OPT.
What you should do is:
1. Apply for pre-completion OPT right away. Once you get your EAD (it'll have a start date on it), register for a C-Corporation after the start date. (Unfortunately, non-citizens cannot start S-Corps, which are actually more suited to startups).
2. Then get a bank account on the company's name; link that account to your PayPal account, and cash the money to the company's bank account. You can then pay yourself a lump-some "salary" or cash it out via stock dividends.
3. Since your pre-completion OPT is authorized only for the summer, you'll have to stop "working for your company" at the end of the OPT period. So that this doesn't bite you again, in the meanwhile you should find a different solution to charging customers such as an international PayPal account or some other payment solution that is not based in the US.
4. Once you graduate, you'll be able to work for you company for atleast 12 months; and if you have a STEM degree (Comp Sci counts as one), you can work for it for an additional 17 months (adding up to a total of 29 months). After that there really aren't any other visas for startups / being self-employed, as the H1B requires that you own less than 50% of the company employing you (the real issue is that "you are not in control of your employment" and that you're fireable -- so even substantial ownership under 50% might be problematic -- but IANAL and I don't know about this. It might indeed be possible to do a startup on an H1B with 3 co-founders. Check with a lawyer.)
5. After the 29 months of post-completion OPT, if you are not particularly attached to the United States, there are many countries that welcome startups and self-employed freelancers and issue visas for such people. One such place is Dubai, a modern metropolitan city with people from various backgrounds. The DTMFZA (Dubai Technology and Media Free Zone Authority) issues Freelance permits (for $3k/year) that let you be self-employed in the country. One of the great things about Dubai (and the UAE in general) are the zero taxes. To top it all, Dubai happens to be a really great city. Other options, perhaps include Singapore and other cities/countries, but I don't know about the immigration/visa deal for freelancers in those countries.
Good luck! If you have any further questions, feel free to reply to this thread -- I'll be monitoring it.
Just want to add, OPT (both pre-completion and post-completion) applications will take around 3 months to process; so you should get the paperwork in right now in order to get your OPT authorized (and receive your EAD card) by mid/late May.
Until then, hopefully you can trust PayPal to hold onto your funds (and not gobble it up for some stupid reason).
You can work for your own company on post completion OPT as well? I'm currently doing it on pre-OPT, but didn't know it was possible. Do you have the same "continous work requirement" as normal employment under post-completion OPT?
> Do you have the same "continous work requirement" as normal employment under post-completion OPT?
If by that you're referring to the rule that mandates you maintain minimal periods of unemployment; Yes.
Since you're running your own company, as long as you don't fire yourself you should fulfill this requirement.
The F-1 OPT status allows for upto 60 days of unemployment though. This means that means if you were to work a regular job, you still do have a little gaps of time in between switching jobs to search for a new job.
I suspect that a good lawyer will be able to recover most of it for him, especially since his presence in the US was not material to the earning of that income.