H1B - Premium or not

[nivje]

I would like to know if H1B premium processing cases take preferential treatment when accounting for the 65k cap.

If I file an application (non-premium) and it is received on April 1st, is it possible that my application can get returned because there were 65000 premium processing cases filed after me and approved?

I am on a L1B status (expiring in early 2005)and my employer is going to file H1B in April. I would like to know if it can be filed on April 1st as a non-premium case (and still be within the cap) since I can wait till October or later for the approval.

Thanks

 

[Arn]

I don't think there is any differential treatment for premium and non- premium cases when the cap is already reached. they will not work on that. But if the cap is not reached yet then premium case will get approval before non-premium.

 

[nivje]

My question is if the cap is not yet reached, will two similar cases (one premium and one non-premium) will be approved even though the premium one will get approval sooner and the other one much later

Or will the non-premium case be returned because other premium cases were filed after that and the cap was reached.

 

[vishsh]

ALL the cases, premium as well as non-premium, that were filed before the cutoff date (which earlier this year was Feb 17th) would be "processed", no matter how many number of H1s get approved. If you have applied for the H1 before the cutoff date, you dont have to worry about how many get approved before yours, because they will have to process yours under that years quota. Now this is what they are doing for the 2004 quota. For the coming years, hopefully it should be the same.