The previously announced filing date cut-offs have been rolled back significantly.
On September 25, the US Department of State issued a revised October Visa Bulletin that contains new and earlier filing cut-off dates than those contained in the original October Visa Bulletin released on September 9. The new filing cut-off dates are apparently in response to concerns raised by the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) about its ability to process a large number of adjustment of status applications.
This new bulletin supersedes the original October bulletin, which contained for the first time filing cut-off dates that allowed the filing of adjustment of status applications before visa numbers were available. The filing cut-off dates that have been adjusted are identified below in Bold type. This alert addresses Employment-Based filing dates only.
Revised filing cut-off dates are as follows:
Employment-
Based
|
All Chargeability
Areas Except
Those Listed
|
China
(mainland
born)
|
India
|
Mexico
|
Philippines
|
1st
|
C
|
C
|
C
|
C
|
C
|
2nd
|
C
|
01JAN13
(changed from 01MAY14)
|
01JUL09
(changed from 01JUL11)
|
C
|
C
|
3rd
|
01SEP15
|
01OCT13
|
01JUL05
|
01SEP15
|
01JAN10
(changed from 01JAN15)
|
Other Workers
|
01SEP15
|
01JAN07
|
01JUL05
|
01SEP15
|
01JAN10
(changed from 01JAN15)
|
4th
|
C
|
C
|
C
|
C
|
C
|
Certain Religious
Workers
|
C
|
C
|
C
|
C
|
C
|
5th Targeted
Employment Areas/
Regional Centers
and Pilot Programs
|
C
|
01MAY15
|
C
|
C
|
C
|
These revised filing cut-off dates will reduce the number of adjustment of status applications that can be filed on October 1; this development will come as an unpleasant surprise to many persons who planned to file such adjustment of status applications on this date, especially those in the EB-2 China, EB-2 India, and EB-3 Philippines categories. Please note that final action or approval cut-off dates in the Employment-Based preference categories remain unchanged.
We will continue to monitor the situation closely and will provide further information as soon as it becomes available.