Visa Lawyer Blog

Articles Posted in USCIS Lockboxes

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Yesterday, Wednesday December 13, 2023, the United States Citizenship, and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced that it will be transitioning the filing location for Form I-907 Requests for Premium Processing Service, when filed for a pending Form I-140, Immigrant Petition for Alien Worker, to appropriate USCIS lockboxes starting Friday December 15, 2023.

This is being done to increase efficiency and reduce the workload of service centers. USCIS has also said that this change will allow it to centralize digitization of these forms for electronic adjudication.

Please note that this change in filing location does not apply to those filing Form I-140 concurrently with an associated application (such as Form I-485, I-765, or Form I-131). USCIS will soon announce a filing location change for these forms. For the time being such forms should be filed with the appropriate service center, as listed on the USCIS webpage Direct Filing Addresses for Form I-140, Immigrant Petition for Alien Worker.

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In this blog post, we share with you the latest news in the world of immigration.

Recently, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced that it has removed the 60-day rule for civil surgeon signatures on Form I-693 Report of Immigration Medical Examination and Vaccination Record, also known as the immigration medical exam.

This form must be completed by a civil surgeon and submitted along with the applicant’s I-485 adjustment of status (green card) application with USCIS.

Green card applicants can now submit their Form I-693 medical examination for up to 2 years after the civil surgeon has signed the form.

Previously, green card applicants were required to have a civil surgeon sign Form I-693 within 60 days of submitting their green card application or risk its rejection with USCIS. The 60-day rule created much confusion among green card applicants and was an unnecessary obstacle to the green card process. Form I-693’s that were not signed within the 60-day period were issued Requests for Evidence (RFE) asking for a compliant Form I-693 signed within the requisite 60-day period.

Now that USCIS has eliminated the 60-day rule, applicants will have more time and flexibility to obtain their signed Form I-693 medical examination without worrying. This change will also decrease the green card backlogs, considering that less RFEs will be issued for deficient Form I-693’s given the 2-year validity period from the date of the civil surgeon’s signature.

In support of its new policy, USCIS has said, “While the 60-day rule was intended to enhance operational efficiency and reduce the need to request updated Forms I-693 from applicants, in practice these efficiencies have not been realized.”

For more information about this new update, please click here.

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The moment we have been waiting for has finally arrived.

Yesterday, March 6, 2023, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced the expansion of premium processing services for certain F-1 students seeking Optional Practical Training (OPT) and F-1 students seeking science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) OPT extensions who have a pending Form I-765, Application for Employment Authorization, and wish to request a premium processing upgrade.

As of yesterday, March 6th USCIS has made possible the online filing of Form I-907, Request for Premium Processing Service, for F-1 students in these categories. USCIS will also accept the latest edition of the Form I-907 by mail.

In support of this move, USCIS Director Ur M. Jaddou said, “The availability of premium processing for certain F-1 students, in addition to the ease of online filing, will streamline the immigration experience for a great many international students.”

Regarding the decision to make online filing of Form I-907 available, he stated, “The ongoing expansion of online filing is a priority for USCIS as we continue to create operational efficiencies and increase access to the immigration system for stakeholders, applicants, petitioners, requestors, and those we serve.”

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We close off the week with some new announcements from the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) regarding TPS extensions for Haitian nationals, and USCIS commitments to improve immigration in the new year – fiscal year 2023.

TPS Extended for Haitian Nationals

On December 5, 2022, the Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro N. Mayorkas, announced that the TPS designation for Haiti will be automatically extended for 18 additional months. Haitian nationals with TPS benefits will have the opportunity to re-register for an extension of their TPS benefits for a period of 18 months from February 4, 2023, through August 3, 2024.

This automatic extension has been granted because the Secretary has determined that conditions continue to exist to support Haiti’s TPS designation due to extraordinary and temporary conditions in the country including a prolonged political crisis, insecurity, gang violence, and catastrophic earthquakes. According to Secretary Mayorkas, “The conditions in Haiti, including socioeconomic challenges, political instability, and gang violence and crime – aggravated by environmental disaster – compelled the humanitarian relief we are providing today.”

As a reminder, Haitians entering the United States after November 6, 2022, are not eligible for TPS benefits and, will be subject to removal from the United States if they have no legal basis to remain in the country.

TPS will apply only to those individuals who have already been residing in the United States as of November 6, 2022, and who meet all other requirements to receive the TPS extension. Those who attempt to travel to the United States after November 6, 2022, are NOT eligible for TPS benefits.

Soon, the Department of Homeland Security will publish a notice in the Federal Register explaining the eligibility criteria and procedures to re-register for TPS, renew Employment Authorization Documents (EADs), and submission of initial TPS application under the re-designation.

For more information, please click here.

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We hope you are having a wonderful end to your week. In this blog post, we bring you some of the most highly anticipated news from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).

Yesterday, September 15, 2022, USCIS announced the third phase of the expansion of premium processing service for petitioners who have a pending Form I-140 Immigrant Petition for Alien Workers, under the EB-1 and EB-2 employment-based classifications.

As with the first and second phase of the premium processing expansion, the third phase of expansion only applies to certain previously filed Form I-140 petitions under the EB-1 multinational executive and manager classification, and EB-2 classification as a member of professions with advanced degrees or exceptional ability seeking a national interest waiver (NIW) that were filed on certain dates. Only such petitions will be eligible to upgrade to premium processing using Form I-907, Request for Premium Processing Service.

Who will benefit?

Beginning September 15, 2022, USCIS will accept Form I-907 Premium Processing requests for:

  • EB-1 multinational executive and manager petitions received on or before January 1, 2022; and
  • EB-2 NIW petitions for advanced degree or exceptional ability received on or before February 1, 2022.

USCIS has explicitly made clear that it will reject premium processing requests for these Form I-140 classifications if the receipt date is after the dates listed above. For cases eligible to upgrade to premium processing, USCIS will guarantee 45 calendar days to take adjudicative action for these requests for premium processing service. USCIS will not accept new (initial) Forms I-140 with a premium processing request at this time for petitions that do not explicitly fall under the above categories.

USCIS also cautions members of the public that on May 24, 2022, the agency published a new version of Form I-907 Request for Premium Processing, dated 05/31/22. As of July 1, 2022, USCIS no longer accepts the older 09/30/20 edition of form I-907.

This move is part of USCIS’ commitment to expand premium processing service to additional form types in order to improve processing times and increase efficiency across the agency.

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Welcome back to Visalawyerblog! New developments are underway by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) to improve the way the agency is communicating case processing times to members of the public.

The agency recently announced new efforts to streamline information provided on its processing times webpage. For each type of immigration benefit, USCIS releases information regarding how much time it is taking the agency to process that particular application, petition, or request. Previously, processing times were estimated based on how long the agency took to approve or deny a certain percentile of forms or petitions over the prior 6-month period.

Now, USCIS has updated their webpage so that users can find the processing time information for their particular type of case, rather than seeing an aggregate of all related case types. This provides applicants with a more accurate picture of how long their particular type of case is taking to be processed.

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Welcome back to Visalawyerblog! In this blog post we share with you the latest immigration news from the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).

New USCIS Policies to Improve the Immigration System

We bring you some exciting news regarding new policies adopted by USCIS that have been designed to remove the barriers to immigration and help improve the current immigration system. The following are among the new changes being implemented by USCIS:

Expedited Processing

Under a newly updated expedite criteria policy, USCIS has now expanded the types of expedite criteria or circumstances under which the adjudication of a benefit request can be expedited, including where a request is made by a nonprofit organization whose request is in the furtherance of cultural and social interests of the United States.

According to the new change:

USCIS may consider an expedite request if it meets one or more of the following criteria or circumstance:

  • Severe financial loss to a company or person, provided that the need for urgent action is not the result of the petitioner’s or applicant’s failure to:
    1. Timely file the benefit request , or
    2. Timely respond to any requests for additional evidence;
  • Emergencies and urgent humanitarian reasons;
  • Nonprofit organization (as designated by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS)) whose request is in furtherance of the cultural and social interests of the United States;
  • U.S. government interests (such as urgent cases for federal agencies such as the U.S. Department of Defense, U.S. Department of Labor, DHS, or other public safety or national security interests); or
  • Clear USCIS error.

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