What Are Bodyshops?
Bodyshop is used as a generic label for contract agencies that import nonimmigrant H-1B and L-1 workers into the U.S. The bodyshop pays the workers and the employer pays the bodyshop. These high-tech “Kelly Girls”are full-time employees of the bodyshop, hired out to clients in the U.S. like Microsoft, Sun Microsystems etc. The bodyshop charges corporate clients an hourly rate and when the project is over the “bodies” return to the bodyshop, which places them with the next client. Bodyshops tend concentrate on high paying white collar jobs such as software programmers or IT, but there are many other types of these agencies for engineers, accountants, school teachers, nurses, welders, construction workers, and even managers. Most people think of bodyshops as Indian owned companies but that’s just because they are the biggest players. Some of them are U.S. owned, such as Manpower, and some are owned by companies in other countries such as the Phillipines.
