In-line for Interview Exactly 1 Month Before Anniversary

[JimmyHou 611]

The in-line for interview status is something that causes a lot of applicants some angst, mainly because it's the only update you get between biometrics and having your interview scheduled, which can be a period of several months.

Quite a while ago, some VJ members started noticing that many applicants who file 90 days early (or at least more than 60 days early) are placed in-line exactly (often to the day) one month before the 3rd of 5th anniversary of their green cards. Just based on all the monthly threads I've read, I'd guess that this has been going on for a couple of years now and that it applies to about 60%-80% of each month's early-filers.

If you don't file early, you obviously can't be placed in-line before your anniversary.

Also, if you file 50 days early, and do you biometrics a month after that, you also won't be placed in-line a month before your anniversary simply because there isn't enough time.

So most people who don't apply early enough to fall into the category I'm talking about, are placed in-line within a week or so of biometrics.

The remaining group; those who aren't placed in-line exactly one month before their anniversary or within a week or two of biometrics usually have a longer wait ahead of them due to a prolonged background check which can take anywhere from a month to, in rare cases, over a year. 3 - 6 months seems to be a more common wait time for this group.

This is all just based on my observation, so we decided to keep track of it for the December 2015 filers. Out of 35 applicants, 11 applied early. Of the 11, 1 got his biometrics appointment less than 1 month before his anniversary, and so does not fall in this category. For the remaining 10, the 1 month before anniversary inline prediction tracker is shown below.

There are always exceptions to these predictions, and no one should worry if they are not placed in-line when they expect; note that every one on the table was eventually placed in-line when their biometrics checks were completed. Also remember that being placed in-line isn't all that special... you could get an interview notice two days later, or you may have a wait of several months ahead of you.

I hope this helps some of you.

Inline date predictor

Keeping track of December 2015 early-filers to test the accuracy of the prediction that you'll be placed inline for interview 1 month before your GC anniversary date assuming you've completed biometrics by then.

Applicant GC Date Inline Prediction
Groovyaardvark 02/15 04/18 Incorrect
spring333 02/19 01/19 Correct
quan12 03/01 02/01 Correct
osune22 03/05 02/05 Correct
Kwakun 03/07 02/08 Correct *
Pete's Dragon 03/13 02/15 Correct **
Ms Hogan 03/14 02/15 Correct **
JimmyHou 03/15 04/26 Incorrect
trangyakan 03/15 02/15 Correct **
Sixer 03/18 02/18 Correct

* 02/07 was a Sunday
** 02/13 and 02/14 were a Saturday and a Sunday - applicants were placed inline on 02/15, which was Presidents Day

Out of the 10 of us who filed early, 8 were placed inline exactly 1 month before the green card anniversary date (with exceptions for weekends). Two of us were not placed inline by the predicted date.

[zz top 14]

Thank you!

[charmander 692]

Good entry JimmyHou!!

People overreact when they don't see their names in line two-days after fingerprinting but this seem to be one of the unwritten rules in practice. Early walk-in biometrics people who do it "with the hope of expediting their application" should pay attention to this. If you have more than 30 days to your 5th (or 3rd for marriage based) anniversary, doing an early biometrics will not move your application ahead of others in your office. As a matter of fact, a lot of people who file later than you would be in line for interview before you. So don't be discouraged when you see cases like this and speculate whether you got stuck in name check or not. But if you are not an early filer say you have your GC for 7 years or 4 years for a marriage based applicant , yes doing an early walk-in would potentially put you ahead of others.

Where the rule doesn't work, it may very well be something to do with the background check. USCIS and FBI aim to return 98% of the biometrics within 30 days after fingerprinting and the remaining 2% within 90 days. With some chance you may be within the unlucky 2%. And if you really get stuck at the name check (I hope none of us experience this), it may take months or years to resolve.

Edited April 27, 2016 by charmander

[JimmyHou 611]

Good entry JimmyHou!!

People overreact when they don't see their names in line two-days after fingerprinting but this seem to be one of the unwritten rules in practice. Early walk-in biometrics people who do it "with the hope of expediting their application" should pay attention to this. If you have more than 30 days to your 5th (or 3rd for marriage based) anniversary, doing an early biometrics will not move your application ahead of others in your office. As a matter of fact, a lot of people who file later than you would be in line for interview before you. So don't be discouraged when you see cases like this and speculate whether you got stuck in name check or not. But if you are not an early filer say you have your GC for 7 years or 4 years for a marriage based applicant , yes doing an early walk-in would potentially put you ahead of others.

Where the rule doesn't work, it may very well be something to do with the background check. USCIS and FBI aim to return 98% of the biometrics within 30 days after fingerprinting and the remaining 2% within 90 days. With some chance you may be within the unlucky 2%. And if you really get stuck at the name check (I hope none of us experience this), it may take months or years to resolve.

I agree with your comment on early biometrics.

I think people should do this if they have a scheduling conflict on their assigned date or if it's convenient and easy and they want to give it a shot; but it really doesn't make much of a difference. Even for people who haven't applied early, it may make a difference of a week or two in a multi-month process.

Of course, in some rare cases it can make a big difference; let's say you live in a city that has oath ceremonies once a year... being interviewed a week earlier could make the difference between becoming a citizen now or 12 months from now. In such a case, early biometrics would help a lot. But in a place like NYC where there are multiple ceremonies a day, it's almost meaningless.

Just as an example, in our December 2015 group, 4 out of the 35 applicants went in for early biometrics and all 4 were allowed to do so (in Miami, Oakland Park, Dallas, and Denver). These applicants were ranked 2nd, 5th, 7th, and 33rd in order of the date they sent their applications. As of today, only one of these 4 applicants has been naturalized (the 2nd out of the December 2015 filers to apply) and that applicant was the 17th out of the 35 total applicants to be naturalized.

There's nothing wrong with trying to do an early walk-in for biometrics, but the evidence doesn't show that it has a significant impact... and if you are a 90-day early filer, it will almost certainly have no benefit.

[johnnyenglish 2]

The in-line for interview status is something that causes a lot of applicants some angst, mainly because it's the only update you get between biometrics and having your interview scheduled, which can be a period of several months.

Quite a while ago, some VJ members started noticing that many applicants who file 90 days early (or at least more than 60 days early) are placed in-line exactly (often to the day) one month before the 3rd of 5th anniversary of their green cards. Just based on all the monthly threads I've read, I'd guess that this has been going on for a couple of years now and that it applies to about 60%-80% of each month's early-filers.

If you don't file early, you obviously can't be placed in-line before your anniversary.

Also, if you file 50 days early, and do you biometrics a month after that, you also won't be placed in-line a month before your anniversary simply because there isn't enough time.

So most people who don't apply early enough to fall into the category I'm talking about, are placed in-line within a week or so of biometrics.

The remaining group; those who aren't placed in-line exactly one month before their anniversary or within a week or two of biometrics usually have a longer wait ahead of them due to a prolonged background check which can take anywhere from a month to, in rare cases, over a year. 3 - 6 months seems to be a more common wait time for this group.

This is all just based on my observation, so we decided to keep track of it for the December 2015 filers. Out of 35 applicants, 11 applied early. Of the 11, 1 got his biometrics appointment less than 1 month before his anniversary, and so does not fall in this category. For the remaining 10, the 1 month before anniversary inline prediction tracker is shown below.

There are always exceptions to these predictions, and no one should worry if they are not placed in-line when they expect; note that every one on the table was eventually placed in-line when their biometrics checks were completed. Also remember that being placed in-line isn't all that special... you could get an interview notice two days later, or you may have a wait of several months ahead of you.

I hope this helps some of you.

Inline date predictor

Keeping track of December 2015 early-filers to test the accuracy of the prediction that you'll be placed inline for interview 1 month before your GC anniversary date assuming you've completed biometrics by then.

Applicant GC Date Inline Prediction

Groovyaardvark 02/15 04/18 Incorrect

spring333 02/19 01/19 Correct

quan12 03/01 02/01 Correct

osune22 03/05 02/05 Correct

Kwakun 03/07 02/08 Correct *

Pete's Dragon 03/13 02/15 Correct **

Ms Hogan 03/14 02/15 Correct **

JimmyHou 03/15 04/26 Incorrect

trangyakan 03/15 02/15 Correct **

Sixer 03/18 02/18 Correct

* 02/07 was a Sunday

** 02/13 and 02/14 were a Saturday and a Sunday - applicants were placed inline on 02/15, which was Presidents Day

Out of the 10 of us who filed early, 8 were placed inline exactly 1 month before the green card anniversary date (with exceptions for weekends). Two of us were not placed inline by the predicted date.

Agree...there is also a chance of applicants getting back to back emails for "In Line" and "Scheduled interview" on the same day or in the next 24-48 hours. One month prior to anniversary that is.

[JimmyHou 611]

One more thing to add... this is another observation I've made, but there will always be exceptions and it's best not to try to depend too much on any "predictions"... just take this (both what I wrote above and what's below) with a grain of salt as an observation as to what usually happens.

We all know that two people who apply on the same day may be placed inline for interview weeks or even months apart, due to prolonged background checks.

So, which date does your field office use in determining when to schedule your interview?

Here's an example:

Harry and Sam both apply in Seattle in 01 Jan 2015 and both go in for biometrics on 01 Feb 2015.

Harry is placed inline on 01-Mar-2015, but Sam is placed inline on 01-Apr-2015.

So does that mean that Sam will be interviewed 1 month after Harry? Apparently the answer is no.

Once applicants are inline, their Priority Dates appear to be the deciding factor for when an interview is scheduled.

A real example of this can be seen in the December 2015 thread.

If you look at Boy15 and JimmyHou, you'll see that they applied 1 week apart and had biometrics appointments 1 week apart (both in Houston). But JimmyHou was placed inline 3.5 months after Boy15. And yet JimmyHou was scheduled for an interview about a week after Boy15 and not 3.5 months later.

There are many other examples that are easy to see by comparing different monthly tables. You'll see, for example, that in the same office, January applicants who are placed inline in April are often interviewed before February applicants who are placed inline in March.

Obviously, this doesn't work at very fast offices, because the applicant who is placed inline first may well have been interviewed before the applicant who applied first is even placed inline.

So in short, an older priority date seems to let you jump ahead in line once you are actually placed inline.

This is important because often, someone who has been waiting 3 months to be placed inline looks at the tables for guidance. He sees that others usually wait 2 months between inline notice and interview notice and thinks he has two months to go. But actually, he may get an interview notice immediately after the inline notice because all the time he was waiting effectively counts in his favor. A good example of this can be seen in the April 2015 thread where another Houston applicant, Dario2012 was not placed inline until December. At that point, Houston applicants were waiting about 2 or 3 months between inline and interview scheduling, but Dario got his interview scheduled almost immediately, Since he had a priority date older than almost everyone else waiting at that point, he jumped ahead of them in line.

I used Houston as an example, but you'll find that in most cases this holds true for all offices that are not particularly fast. For instance, this wouldn't work in Columbus, because almost everyone gets their interviews scheduled right after the inline notice anyway.

So if you've been inline for a long time, the good news is that once you're placed inline, you'll almost certainly get an interview before those who applied after you but were placed inline before you (unless you've been waiting so long that they've already been interviewed).

Edited May 4, 2016 by JimmyHou

[charmander 692]

One more thing to add... this is another observation I've made, but there will always be exceptions and it's best not to try to depend too much on any "predictions"... just take this (both what I wrote above and what's below) with a grain of salt as an observation as to what usually happens.

We all know that two people who apply on the same day may be placed inline for interview weeks or even months apart, due to prolonged background checks.

So, which date does your field office use in determining when to schedule your interview?

Here's an example:

Harry and Sam both apply in Seattle in 01 Jan 2015 and both go in for biometrics on 01 Feb 2015.

Harry is placed inline on 01-Mar-2015, but Sam is placed inline on 01-Apr-2015.

So does that mean that Sam will be interviewed 1 month after Harry? Apparently the answer is no.

Once applicants are inline, their Priority Dates appear to be the deciding factor for when an interview is scheduled.

A real example of this can be seen in the December 2015 thread.

If you look at Boy15 and JimmyHou, you'll see that they applied 1 week apart and had biometrics appointments 1 week apart (both in Houston). But JimmyHou was placed inline 3.5 months after Boy15. And yet JimmyHou was scheduled for an interview about a week after Boy15 and not 3.5 months later.

There are many other examples that are easy to see by comparing different monthly tables. You'll see, for example, that in the same office, January applicants who are placed inline in April are often interviewed before February applicants who are placed inline in March.

Obviously, this doesn't work at very fast offices, because the applicant who is placed inline first may well have been interviewed before the applicant who applied first is even placed inline.

So in short, an older priority date seems to let you jump ahead in line once you are actually placed inline.

This is important because often, someone who has been waiting 3 months to be placed inline looks at the tables for guidance. He sees that others usually wait 2 months between inline notice and interview notice and thinks he has two months to go. But actually, he may get an interview notice immediately after the inline notice because all the time he was waiting effectively counts in his favor. A good example of this can be seen in the April 2015 thread where another Houston applicant, Dario2012 was not placed inline until December. At that point, Houston applicants were waiting about 2 or 3 months between inline and interview scheduling, but Dario got his interview scheduled almost immediately, Since he had a priority date older than almost everyone else waiting at that point, he jumped ahead of them in line.

I used Houston as an example, but you'll find that in most cases this holds true for all offices that are not particularly fast. For instance, this wouldn't work in Columbus, because almost everyone gets their interviews scheduled right after the inline notice anyway.

So if you've been inline for a long time, the good news is that once you're placed inline, you'll almost certainly get an interview before those who applied after you but were placed inline before you (unless you've been waiting so long that they've already been interviewed).

Basically they are using a priority queue, where the weight is on the priority date of the case. If the queue is empty it doesn't matter but for loaded cities they don't want the candidate suffer even further.

[JimmyHou 611]

Basically they are using a priority queue, where the weight is on the priority date of the case. If the queue is empty it doesn't matter but for loaded cities they don't want the candidate suffer even further.

Yes, exactly. That's what I said, I just used more words! ;-)

But it really wasn't clear to some people if it was the inline date or the PD that marked your place in the queue... the "inline" moniker makes people think that that date determines their place in the queue, but it doesn't.

[JimmyHou 611]

I thought I'd just bring this thread up again because it's been a while and some recent applicants have been wondering about inline dates.

Hope it helps!

[charmander 692]

I thought I'd just bring this thread up again because it's been a while and some recent applicants have been wondering about inline dates.

Hope it helps!

This issue relates to a lot of people. How can we have this thread pinned on the first page?

[JimmyHou 611]

This issue relates to a lot of people. How can we have this thread pinned on the first page?

A moderator can pin it, but I don't know if it's really all that important... personally, I don't think it is... the inline status doesn't mean all that much.

I think people can search for it if they want to. The VJ search tool is useful and very underused!

USCIS could decide to get rid of the inline update tomorrow and it wouldn't make much of a difference.

But the moderators in their wisdom can decide. :-)

A general guide to the process timeline, including this as a subsection, would be a better topic to pin. Maybe I'll write up a post like that when I'm all done.

Edited June 21, 2016 by JimmyHou

[charmander 692]

I think it is important enough that the monthly threads are filled with "It's been weeks/month since I gave my fingerprints, I saw a lot of people are placed in line two days after their biometrics. I am really worried I got stuck in background check. What should I do?" postings.

[JimmyHou 611]

I think it is important enough that the monthly threads are filled with "It's been weeks/month since I gave my fingerprints, I saw a lot of people are placed in line two days after their biometrics. I am really worried I got stuck in background check. What should I do?" postings.

True. People do get very anxious about this.

[charmander 692]

True. People do get very anxious about this.

Maybe it doesn't need to be a pinned by itself. Not sure how many people check this page http://www.visajourney.com/content/naturalization_process but they could add this information there. That page is not pinned either.

Edited June 21, 2016 by charmander

[at long last 58]

My priority date is June 13, 2016. But isn't that just the day they received it? I think there is a method to their madness and as long as it can be completed in time to vote I'm good.

Being told that would delay my application processing if I had to reschedule I wasn't about to wait. That's why I walked in early just in case. If they wouldn't do my biometrics early then at least I could get the rescheduling done early.

Edited June 22, 2016 by at long last