NVC SUSPENDS ITS TELEPHONE INQUIRY LINE

The National Visa Center (NVC) has announced that it is suspending its telephone inquiry line effective May 23, 2022. The move comes as an attempt to address a backlog of inquiry requests at the NVC.

The NVC is facing “critical backlogs” of inquiry requests, and current response times to inquiries are approximately 2 months. The NVC will still accept inquiry requests for immigrant cases using its online form, but asks that follow-up inquiries not be made while the first inquiry is still within the NVC’s reported response timeframe.

The NVC has not yet announced when it expects to resume accepting inquiry requests via telephone.

PREMIUM PROCESSING WILL EXPAND TO INCLUDE CERTAIN PENDING EB-1 AND EB-2 I-140 PETITIONS

As part of its initiative to expand premium processing eligibility, on May 24, 2022, USCIS issued a news alert that its premium processing program will be expanded to include certain pending I-140 petitions filed under the EB-1 and EB-2 categories.

This expansion of premium processing only applies to certain previously filed Form I-140 petitions and will occur in phases:

·         Beginning June 1, 2022, USCIS will accept Form I-907 premium processing upgrade requests for E13 multinational executive and manager petitions received on or before Jan. 1, 2021.

·         Beginning July 1, 2022, USCIS will accept Form I-907 premium processing upgrade requests for E21 NIW petitions received on or before June 1, 2021, and E13 multinational executive and manager petitions received on or before March 1, 2021. 

New (initial) I-140 filings for the categories above are not eligible for premium processing at this time.

USCIS will reject any premium processing requests for the classifications above that are filed before the appropriate start date. 

JUNE 2022 VISA BULLETIN: ANALYSIS AND PREDICTIONS

The Department of State has just issued the June 2022 Visa Bulletin.  This is the ninth Visa Bulletin of Fiscal Year 2022. This blog post analyzes this month's Visa Bulletin.

Visa Bulletin

Table A: Final Action Dates -- Applications with these dates may be approved for their Green Card (Permanent Residency card) or Immigrant Visa appointment.

 

EB	Worldwide	CHINA	INDIA	PHILIPPINES
1st	C	C	C	C
2nd	C	01MAR19	08JUL13	C
3rd	C	22MAR18	15JAN12	C
Other workers	08MAY19	01JUN12	15JAN12	08MAY19

Table B: Dates of Filing

The USCIS is expected to use the Table B Dates of Filing chart for I-485 employment-based filings. See: USCIS Visa Bulletin Dates

MU Law Analysis

You will notice that we have added another row, Other Workers.  These are EB-3’s for occupations that require less than two years of education or experience to perform the job.  Among healthcare occupations, there are most commonly nurse aides.  The retrogression to 08May2019 probably reflects full usage of this category in this fiscal year.

For the other categories, we saw exceptional news for India EB-2, which advanced a full year.  All EB-1, along with Worldwide and Philippine EB-3 remained current.  We do expect a retrogression of WW and Philippine EB-3 before the end of the fiscal year.  This is common, as we have explained in the past.

EB-3 India and EB-3 China will remain unchanged from May.  We do not expect forward progress in these categories for the rest of the fiscal year.

USCIS ANNOUNCES INCREASES AUTOMATIC EXTENSION PERIOD FOR CERTAIN EADS

Beginning May 4, 2022, the USCIS’s automatic extension period for certain EAD categories will temporarily increase from 180 days to up to 540 days.

This is a welcomed change in policy as many EAD extension petitions currently take more than 180 days to be adjudicated. Under the previous policy, an EAD holder was forced to stop working if the extension petition was not approved within the 180 days automatic extension period. Increasing the automatic extension period to up to 540 days will provide relief to many EAD holders and help prevent gaps in employment.

The automatic extension only applies to certain categories of EAD holders who timely file an extension petition before the expiration of their previous EAD. This includes H4 EAD holders with a valid I-94 and green card applicants. A full list of qualifying categories can be found on USCIS’s website.

Unfortunately, OPT-based EADs and applicants changing the category their EAD is authorized under are not eligible for the automatic extension.

The increased automatic extension period will end on October 26, 2023.