LewsLaw Monthly Immigration Newsletter August 2009 Volume 1, Number 6
Extension of Expiration Date of Form I-9
On August 27, 2009, USCIS announced that the Office of Management and Budget has extended its approval of Form I-9 to August 31, 2012. Consequently, USCIS has amended the form to reflect a new revision date of August 7, 2009. Employers may use Form I-9 with the revision date of either August 7, 2009 or February 2, 2009. The revision dates are located on the bottom right-hand portion of the form. To obtain Form I-9 and the Handbook for Employers, visit www.uscis.gov/I-9.
Change of Schedule for Stand Alone Application Support Centers (ASC)
USCIS announced that as of November 2, 2009 stand alone Application Support Centers (ASC) will be open Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. All stand alone ASCs will be closed on Saturday, October 31, 2009 and will reopen on Monday, November 2, 2009 under the new Monday to Friday schedule. The last Saturday that stand-alone ASCs will be open for business is Saturday, October 24, 2009. ASCs capture biometrics – fingerprints, photographs and signatures in order to verify the identity of and conduct background checks on immigration benefit applicants.
Temporary Suspension of Non-Immigrant Visa Services in Honduras
Effective August 26, 2009, due to the political crisis in Honduras, U.S. Department of State is suspending non-emergency, non-immigrant visa services in the consular section of U.S. Embassy in Honduras.
Duplicate Receipt Numbers on I-90s
The National Benefits Center (NBC) discovered this week that the Phoenix Lockbox inadvertently issued already-used receipt numbers to new I-90 (replacement of I-551s – “green cards”) filings. On August 8, 2009, the Lockbox converted to a new data center and the counter for receipt numbers was turned back to “0”. As a result, 8900-9300 I-90s were issued receipt numbers that had already been issued in May. The series of receipt numbers affected is MSC 09 900 00000 to MSC 09 900 27319. The Lockbox is re-issuing receipt or reject notices to applicants with new/correct receipt numbers, as appropriate. New numbers were assigned beginning August 24, 2009 and it is hoped that this activity will be completed by Wednesday, August 26, 2009. Letters of explanation will accompany the new notices.
H-1B cap subject numbers reach 45,000
As of 08-14-2009, USCIS had received 45,000 H-1B cap subject visa petitions.
Vermont Service Center Alert
The Vermont Service Center (VSC) has advised that approximately 1000 Requests for Evidence (RFEs) were prepared on June 4, 2009, but mistakenly never sent.
Approximately 300 of these cases, which were supposed to receive RFEs, have been denied based on abandonment. For these denied cases, VSC will re-open the case on service motion and re-send the RFE. If a motion was filed, on these cases, VSC will refund the fee. VSC believes that this error was isolated to June 4, 2009.
September 2009 Employment Visa Numbers
The State Department’s Visa Bulletin for September 2009 indicates that Second Preference Employment Based Visa Numbers for China and India have progressed to 01-08-2005 (a 15 month jump) from the previous cut off date of 10-01-2003. However, with the new fiscal year beginning on 10-01-2009, the next visa bulletin may show that 2nd preference visa numbers for India and China may settle back to 2003 and then progress slowly forward. This fifteen month jump is likely to enable USCIS to adjudicate pending I-485s with the hope of using visa numbers which continue to be available before the end of this fiscal year, i.e. 09-30-2009. Of course employment based visa numbers for Third preference continue to be unavailable. First Preference remains current, as does Second preference for the world.