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nemessis

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05/05/2004: USCIS Move to Reduce RFEs

The AILA has reported that yesterday the USCIS started its move to reduce issuance of RFEs which had burdened the agency with tons of workloads leading to the delays in adjudication and backlogs. This move cuts both ways for the customers. But before we get to this point, let's find out the skeleton of the agency's new guidelines.

Outright Denial for Failure to Meet Basic Statutory/Regulatory "Substantive" Qualification Requirements:

From today, the agency will deny petitions or applications if the filing fails to meet the "threshold" eligibility requirements for the petitions or applications. This will help the agency to throw out either frivolous or totally ineligible cases without wasting any time and money.

Outright Denial for Failure to Submit "Sufficient" Evidence to Establish Eligibility:

When the petitioners or applicants submit the required basic threshold supporting documentation which meet the "initial" evidence requirement under the statute and regulation, the agency will not give additional opportunity to supplement the evidence by issuing RFE. Accordingly, it will be critically important that the petitioners or applicants go an extra mile to document not just de minimus threshold evidence but sufficient evidence to prove the threshold requirements.

RFE is required When "Initial" Records Are Missing:

The statutes and regulations list the record requirements for filing of petitions or applications. If such records or evidence are missing, the agency will continue to issue RFE.

The positive impact of this move is obviously reduction of backlog. This web site has been advocating such move all along.
However, one should not ignore the negative side of this decision. People will see increased number of denials in the mail without RFEs.

A couple of things people should be conscious in presenting a case from here on:

Meticulous Documentation for Threshold:

One cannot sit on a minimal documentation anymore. The agency cited as an illustration issue of "employer's financial ability to pay the proffered salary" to the alien employees. If the least amount of evidence is submitted to establish this requirement, which the agency believes failed to prove this requirement, the case will be denied outright. From here on, "extra" documentation may be a prudent thing to do.

EAD vs. H-1B Strategy for I-485 Filers: The risk of working on EAD rather than H-1B status will increase substantially under the new policy. Once I-485 is denied, the alien loses the legal status immediately if the alien worked on EAD rather than a nonimmigrant status. The agency will immediately revoke the EAD. The only recourses available will be either an appeal or a motion to reconsider or a motion to reopen. Meanwhile, those who work on H-1B will not be affected by such denial when it comes to their H-1B employment and legal status. Besides, those who work on EAD rather than a nonimmigrant status are subject to removal (exclusion) proceedings as they do not have any specific nonimmigrant status when the I-485 application is denied. Another important point to remember for the 7th-year H-1B extension eligible professionals. Under the current court decision, the denial of agency does not deprive them of eligibility for the 7th-year extension "if" an appeal has been filed timely. The court determined that "final decision" under the AC 21 that stops the eligibility for the 7th extension eligibility would not arrive until a decision is made by an appeal unit. It is thus likely that people will witness an increased number of appeals to seek remedy for the legal issues and to preserve their right to the 7th-year H-1B extension pending appeal.
05/05/2004: U.S. to Launch Preflight Immigration Inspection
 
What are they trying to do? this would give them full control...more then 60% cases get RFE's sometimes for Education eval,exp letters,original w2,employer's financial, if ur lawyer forget to send something, u r done....doono about my friends...i am not too happy abt this...though i still have to see what others have to say abt this...may be that would change the direction of my thought process...but right now, i am not happy with this thing...
 
Some effects could be:

1. It will generate lot of revenue for CIS as an application will come 2-3 times with new application fee each time.

2. No. of pending applications at CIS could drop because of this after some time (reduction of backlog or 'front log' ?)

3. People (we) will stop hiring/trusting lawyers of low caliber who wait for a few RFEs before sending all the basic documents.

4. Weak applications (non-existent companies, companies in dire financial conditions) may not make to the processing queue at all.

PS: The news from www.immigration-law.com is not accurate most of the time. This is my observation. Wait for reliable news update from AILA site or USCIS.
 
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If it is true , then this the right time u gave me the news , thanks buddy (nemesis) , my H1-B expires on 06-06-2004 , USCIS sucks man we are in trouble man :(
 
changing queues... that's all

This is just a way to move backlogs from case adjudication to appeals. Naturally everyone who is denied will appeal , so by showing good reduction in backlogs, USCIS just wants to avoid the problems instead of solving them..


In the process, we all are getting screwed............:mad: :mad: :mad:

First we lost the AC21 support with that F@$!!^% memo and now this.

How can these guys be soooooooo insensitive.

will_get_there
 
I don't think the this is so dramatic and scary like some guys see it ... Please don't go so fast from one extreme to another ... one day you're excited about FO memo next day depressed about other news. Stay somewhere in the middle ...

I don't think they will reject applic because of W2, employment letters etc, for which they used to generate RFE before ... it should be something we don't fully understand yet, same thing goes for FO memo.

Let's wait and see what's happening ...
 
Originally posted by nemessis
I don't think the this is so dramatic and scary like some guys see it ... Please don't go so fast from one extreme to another ... one day you're excited about FO memo next day depressed about other news. Stay somewhere in the middle ...

I don't think they will reject applic because of W2, employment letters etc, for which they used to generate RFE before ... it should be something we don't fully understand yet, same thing goes for FO memo.

Let's wait and see what's happening ...

For once, I agree with nemesiss!! Lets wait and see what's happening...
 
More news from the same source

05/07/2004: New 485 Filing and Processing Agenda

* USCIS has yet to announce the backlog reduction agenda which they scheduled in May or June 2004. However, USCIS Service Center sources gave us a glimpse of the direction towards which the USCIS were heading. According to the sourcs, USCIS implemented a nine-month delay in fingerprint scheduling this year to alleviate the problem of fingerprints expiring prior to adjudication of the case. Reportedly, however, the Service Centers have been recently directed by the USCIS HQ to schedule fingerprinting upon receiving of I-485 applications, even though there is an anticipation that some of those cases may still experience some delays due to the backlogs at the Application Support Centers. This fingerprint agenda change is implemented with a targeted 485 processing time reduction to the period of validity of fingerprint (Fingerprint is valid for 15 months) by early next fiscal year. Fiscal Year starts on October 1, 2004. Additionally, by the end of this year, the USCIS will have installed a system which will capture and store the fingerprints, allowing the agency to obtain new pringer print results without 485 applicants being reprinted. Accordingly, in the near future, refingerprinting may be totally eliminated. Such change will allow the agency to reduce I-485 to 6 months by the end of FY 2006 (September 30, 2006).

* All in all, the six-month I-485 processing times is at quite distance away, but we may, hopefully, see some level of processing time reduction within the year. Let's cross our fingers.
 
SCARED..THIS IS WHAT I HEARD from my Lawyer..Please HELP

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Hi Guys,
I've been anxiously waiting for my cousines approval. They had receiced RFE in October 2003 and RFE response was received by USCIS on 12/3 and 12/9 respectively. It is a EB2 from VSC with CP option form Mumbai. My cosines are currently working in India. It's almost six months but we have not received any news on I140. My lawyers called INS twice and each time they asked to call back in a month. Meanwhile, my lawayer spoke with his AILA rep. and this is what I heard:
================================================== =======
"got off the phone with my AILA rep at 5pm today. He indicated that due to
the recent Memo from USCIS, they are summarily denying I-140's for lack of
sufficient evidence. We have indication that we might not have good news.
He said he thought our filings may get denied along with the 30 others he
saw. If it is denied, there are several options that we can discuss. Let's
wait for the correspondence. Don't get too worried, we'll figure out a game
plan. Remember if his info is correct on our filings, this will be a new
territory for us, since we have not had a denial to date. I will pool
together all resources to move forward. Let's wait."
================================================== ======
Atulh, or any of you out there are ware of this? Is this true? I hope it's false. Would you please share your thoughts or experience as I'm VERY VERY worried.
 
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