USCIS told me they are working on Augest now not June

[Aneel 3]

I just faxed my expedite request-Again!!. I faxed one on January 18, 2011 after receiving a letter from CSC requesting to provide a doctors letter but no reply. I have my finger's crossed. I know of one person whose receipt date is on August 16, 2011 and had their case approved on January 27, 2012. My receipt date is August 11, 2011 and I have yet to receive anything. By the way January 27 was my birthday! I hope I never have to deal with USCIS again in my life!

Edited January 31, 2012 by Aneel

[Therealworld 90]

Different reps are processing their workload at different paces. Some process faster than others and this you must keep in mind along with the large volume of work that is not listed here on VJ. Different petitions have different priorities and if there is a large backlog in the high priorities they take people from the other petitions in order to get the large backlog down.

[Olomi_811 130]

I just hung up with USCIS and was told that they are currently processing July 12th applicants. She said to allow 60 days from today to see if they will get to my filing date. (I need a thumbs down emoticon)

[princess18 3]

Here's my take, opinion on the processing estimates provided by USCIS Customer "Service".

They most likely only update the official processing date once a month or so. They were reporting June 16 for at least 2 months which was probably true due to the fact that there was a clear slow down at the end of the year. Now that the pace has picked up the reported date should start advancing faster again.

If you follow the VJ users who reported receiving their NOA2 the past week or so it would appear that they are working July 18-19 or so. There are recent approvals from users in late July and even one for early August, but I know that at least in one of those cases they requested and received an expedite.

Regarding the random WAC#'s that show initial review that were received in June and earlier, keep in mind that these can include applications for all types of family members. It is my understanding that the wait is longer for those that don't qualify under IR-1/CR-1.

For those of you with September and October NOA1 dates I wouldn't be surprised if CSC is able to get back to approving petitions in under 5 months. USCIS has a page that shows trends over the past 24 months and if this year follows those trends there should be a spike in approvals during February. This same trend showed a slow down at the end of the year. I'm guessing this slow down is caused by a combination of higher than average vacation days and a shifted focus towards other types of visa applications that have a shorter window of approval, like work visas.

Bottom line, we should see an increase in the number of approvals in the coming weeks and the processing time should start to drop below the current 6 1/2 month mark.

For those that are getting close my suggestion would be to be ready now for the NVC phase. Once the NVC assigns a number to your case the process really moves fast and is mostly dependent on how ready you are. Make sure you qualify to sponsor your spouse under the AOS requirements and if you don't make sure you have a qualified co-sponsor ready now. For the Visa application make sure you have the required documents, especially the police certificate from any country your spouse resided in after 16 years of age.

Thank you! That's pretty much what I had in mind as well. Either way, things seem to be looking up now.

[Alia&Jerald 5]

I have had all NVC papers ready since like a week after I sent my i130 in august so...USCIS COME ON MOVE IT... NVC COME MY WAY PLEASE! CANT WAIT TO GET THE BALL MOVING HERE AND SEE MY TIMELINE MOVE CLOSER THE END DATE- POE!

[Trav&Shell 83]

Thank you! That's pretty much what I had in mind as well. Either way, things seem to be looking up now.

Hooray! This is fabulous news! Even if there's no NOA2 yet, I'm happy dancing! Soon...

[american Girl 2]

good luck!!!

I'm a July filer and it still haven't approved. July 26...wow Im trying to have it expedited since my husband interview is March 1 and his son is just sitting on someone desk with coffee stains on it and being shifted from one side to the other side of some1 desk....

[GCPony 14]

I just hung up with USCIS and was told that they are currently processing July 12th applicants. She said to allow 60 days from today to see if they will get to my filing date. (I need a thumbs down emoticon)

Exactly what I was told last Friday. Folks? It can take weeks to process a single "day" of requests. It all depends on how many request come in per day/week/month.

In November, for example, USCIS shows CSC completed a little over 10,000 cases, but received over 18,000 new ones the same month, with over 100,000 old cases still pending. And that's just for the I-130!

Seems to me, since USCIS is "for profit", they could easily afford bringing in more workers. Heck, if a caseworker adjudicates 3 cases per day, at $400 for every I-130 filed, they'd be making a massive fortune hiring a few hundred workers. Nobody can tell me that case workers earn over $1,000 USD per day.

But if they do? SIGN ME UP!

Edited January 31, 2012 by GCPony

[princess18 3]

Hooray! This is fabulous news! Even if there's no NOA2 yet, I'm happy dancing! Soon...

LOL! I know... just feels good to be inching closer.

[Trav&Shell 83]

LOL! I know... just feels good to be inching closer.

LOL...inching...ever so slowly!