IN THIS GUIDE · Employer-sponsored costs for one employee and the agreement behind them
Start with the GOLD CARD eligibility and application overview
Corporate pricing differs from individual pricing
Under the corporate route the sponsoring entity faces a nonrefundable US$15,000 processing fee per employee and a US$2 million gift for that principal. An individual applying on their own account faces the same US$15,000 fee but a US$1 million gift. The difference of a million dollars is the first number an employer should put in front of its finance team, alongside the question of whether the employee could reasonably apply independently instead.
Ongoing corporate terms belong in the budget
The corporate program is described as carrying a 1% annual maintenance charge and a 5% transfer fee. Those are recurring or event-driven costs, not part of the headline gift, and they belong in a multi-year budget rather than a single approval memo. Because published terms can change, have counsel confirm the current wording — what the percentages apply to, when maintenance falls due, and what triggers a transfer — before the board signs anything.
Put the arrangement in writing
Sponsorship of this size deserves a written agreement negotiated before filing, not after approval. Set out who pays the processing fee and the gift, whether any repayment or service commitment applies if the employee resigns early, how the arrangement interacts with the employment contract, and who bears the cost if the application is unsuccessful. Ask counsel and a tax adviser how employer-funded amounts are treated for both the company and the individual.
The employee still has to qualify
Corporate funding does not change what the employee must satisfy. The individual still needs to be eligible for lawful permanent residence, be admissible, and receive a determination under EB-1 or EB-2 subject to visa availability. The company cannot pay away an inadmissibility ground. It is also worth noting what the program does not impose: unlike EB-5, there is no job-creation requirement attached to the Gold Card.
Have the committee ask the eligibility question, not the budget question
Corporate approval processes are built to evaluate spending, and this is a case where the spending question is the easier one and the wrong place to start. Three things should reach the committee before any figure does. First, an assessment of whether the employee's record could support a determination under EB-1 or EB-2, since that determination still has to be made and remains subject to visa availability. Second, a confidential screening of the employee's immigration history by a qualified adviser, because the payment purchases neither a classification nor relief from any ground of inadmissibility, and a difficulty in the record is not something the company's funding can address. Third, confirmation of the current program terms and amounts from official sources rather than from an internal summary or a presentation prepared earlier in the year, since neither the terms nor the figures are fixed. Only when those three are in hand does the financial analysis mean anything, because until then the committee is pricing a possibility rather than a plan. Sequencing it this way also protects the employee, who is otherwise asked to place a good deal of personal history in front of an employer before anyone has established that the exercise is worth undertaking. Hypothetical example: a company's first paper contains a five-year cost schedule and no eligibility view, and the second paper reverses the order and reaches a different recommendation.
Sources reviewed 2026-09-07. This guide covers a preparation focus; it is not an individual eligibility assessment.