***UPDATE 4/19/18 – Our office is finally starting to see some filing fee checks cashed today***
ImmigrationGirl.com readers know that USCIS announced yesterday that it completed the H-1B lottery on the 190,098 petitions received in the first five business days of the filing window.
All petitions received by USCIS at the Vermont and California Service Centers were first reviewed for completeness (proper filing fee checks, all forms completed and signed properly, certified LCA included, correct Service Center, etc). NOTE, they do not review any petition on the merits yet (many have asked whether they will reject duplicate or multiple petitions filed for the same person at this stage based on the recent memo, and the answer is NO).
Those that make the cut are assigned a random computer generated number. The Advanced Degree petitions (US masters or higher) are separated and 20,000 are selected by lottery. Those not selected will then be pooled with the Regular Cap petitions (bachelors degree or non-US degree). Another lottery will be conducted to choose the remaining 65,000 petitions.
The exact number selected is not exactly 65,000 (plus the additional 20,000 filed under the master’s cap). Up to 6,800 visas are set aside from the 65,000 each fiscal year for the H-1B1 Chile and Singapore visas, but unused H-1B1 visas from last year will be added back. Further, the potential H-1B petitions selected and then later withdrawn or denied must be accounted for. It is my understanding that the number of these cases is relatively stable from one year to the next and can be predicted for this year. USCIS uses this past data to determine the number of additional petitions to select so that the overall number equals 85,000. This has generally resulted in 25,000 petitions selected for the master’s cap and 75,000 selected for the bachelor’s cap.
There is no waitlist!
Those in F-1 status with an OPT expiring before June 1st should be able to obtain a new I-20 from your school that extends your stay and work authorization via the cap gap until June 1st. Once a receipt notice is issued, then your school should be able to issue you another I-20 extending your cap gap until September 30th. More info on the cap gap is available here.
If your petition is selected, we usually won’t start getting those receipt notices until late April and on into mid-May. The receipt notices come via snail mail and are sent only to the employer or attorney. If you get a receipt notice, that means your case was selected (note that your case still has to go through the adjudication process, selection does not mean approved).
I’ll start posting statistics as soon as we start receiving receipt notices.
***UPDATE 4/19/18 – Our office is finally starting to see some filing fee checks cashed today***
Only your employer or attorney will receive the receipt notice. You will not be notified by USCIS at all. This is a tough point for some as they tend to question whether or not their employer actually filed the application. So, how can you know if your application was filed? First, make sure you get a copy of your LCA. The employer is required to provide this to you. Next, see if you can get the tracking number of the package mailed to USCIS. You can also try asking for a copy of the petition that was filed, but there is no requirement that the employer share this with you and many will not do so. Until your employer shares an actual receipt notice with you, unfortunately not much else can be done. You won’t be able to call USCIS as only the employer or attorney can do so.
Usually in June, those petitions that were not selected will start to arrive in the mail. They are sent to the attorney or employer. Again, no notification will be given directly to you. The returned petition will include a cover sheet from USCIS with your computer generated number on it and a statement that your petition was not selected in the lottery. I’ll post when we start receiving those as well.
If your employer has not received a receipt notice yet, but their filing fee check has been cashed for your petition, that means that your petition was selected.
If you are an F-1 student, you may be able to check with your DSO if the SEVIS system shows a pending H-1B.
Without premium processing and with cases still pending from last year, expect a long wait for approvals this year. Once premium processing opens up in September, your employer can upgrade at that time.
I also expect a higher number of RFEs (Request for Evidence) again this year as USCIS is interpreting the definition of specialty occupation more strictly. You can find out more about the most common RFEs here.
Please note that I do not share the number of applications filed by my firm. We typically have a large enough sample size to give us an idea of how things are progressing.
That’s all I can think of for now. What other questions do you have that I have not covered here?
***UPDATE 4/19/18 – Our office is finally starting to see some filing fee checks cashed today***