Anyone can print business cards that say immigration services, and a great many people do. The narrow question that matters before you hand over a passport, a diploma, or four figures in fees is whether this particular person is permitted to sign a Form G-28 and appear on your behalf before U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. That permission comes from one of two places: an active law license in at least one state, or accreditation from the Department of Justice while working at a recognized organization. Everything else is somebody helping you fill in forms, which is not the same thing and is priced very differently.
1. Match the bar number to a name and a status, not just a name
Every state bar publishes a member search, and the useful output is four fields: the license number, the admission date, the current status, and any public discipline. Type in the number rather than the name, because names repeat and numbers do not. Active is the only status that lets someone practice; inactive, suspended, resigned, and administratively suspended all mean the person cannot take your case today, whatever their letterhead says. If the firm's website lists three attorneys and only one appears in any state's records, you have learned something about who will actually be doing the work.
2. Read the EOIR list of disciplined practitioners before you sign
The Executive Office for Immigration Review, within the Department of Justice, is responsible for practitioner discipline in immigration matters and maintains a public list of people who have been expelled or suspended from practice before the immigration courts, the Board of Immigration Appeals, and the Department of Homeland Security. This is a separate system from state bar discipline, and the two do not always move in step. Someone can hold an active license in one state and still be barred from immigration practice, or be under an interim suspension that has not yet surfaced anywhere else. It takes a minute to check and it is the single search most people skip.
3. Understand what an accredited representative is allowed to do
A Department of Justice accredited representative is not a lawyer, and that is not a demotion. Accreditation is granted to an individual at a specific nonprofit that has been recognized by EOIR, and it comes in two grades: partial accreditation covers practice before USCIS, while full accreditation adds the immigration courts and the Board. These offices are often excellent, frequently cheaper than a firm, and genuinely accountable, because the accreditation attaches to the organization and can be withdrawn. The practical limits are subject matter and capacity. Many recognized organizations focus on humanitarian and family cases and will tell you plainly that an H-1B or a PERM-based adjustment is outside what they take on.
4. Know why a consultant or a notario is a different category entirely
In much of Latin America a notario público is a trained lawyer with substantial authority, and the word carries that weight when it appears on a storefront in the United States, where a notary public can witness a signature and nothing more. The Federal Trade Commission treats immigration services fraud as a consumer protection matter, and most states now regulate what non-lawyer form preparers may charge and advertise. A preparer who types your answers into a form is not unlawful in itself. Someone who calls himself a consultant, advises you on which category to file under, and signs paperwork as your representative has crossed a line that will follow your case.
5. Judge the first meeting by what it produces
A consultation that was worth attending ends with three things written down: which visa or immigrant category fits your facts, what the sequence and rough timeline looks like, and what the total cost breaks into between professional fees and government filing fees. You should also leave knowing which specific person will prepare the petition and which one will sign the G-28. Warning signs are consistent. Guaranteed approval, pressure to pay cash today, a promise to file something that does not match what you described, an unwillingness to put fees in writing, and blank forms presented for your signature all point the same direction.
Keep the notes. If a case later goes wrong, the record of who told you what, and under what license number, is what a second attorney will ask for first, and it is far easier to gather now than to reconstruct later.