"Never trust girl and rain in London - on western side of Atlantic do not belv USCIS"
Not entirely true. USCIS or INS has improved a lot. Our situation is much much better than for those before.
1. Could not change jobs as soon as H1 transfer is filed
2. No online status was available (or even telephone)
3. Could not extend beyond 6 years on H1, only option was to go back
4. None of the Dates 485 were current, there was a waiting time as much as
3.5 years in EB3, just to file for 485
5. No AC21 portability facility
6. No concurrent filing option
7. No Premium processing on H1
There are other things that are going wrong, some of them attributed to Sep 11, but overall things are much better off. Without some of these changes, I would have been home long back.