Federal Register Comment Period for Proposed USCIS Fee Schedule

[Anna&Jim 52]

When would those proposed fee changes go into effect, does anyone know?

In their webpage USCIS says this is a proposal and invite public comment, we will know more in 60 days when they publish a final rule in the Federal Register.

https://www.uscis.gov/news/alerts/federal-register-comment-period-proposed-uscis-fee-schedule

[charmander 692]

This is the link to the whole report on Federal Register: https://www.federalregister.gov/articles/2016/05/04/2016-10297/us-citizenship-and-immigration-services-fee-schedule

PDF: https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2016-05-04/pdf/2016-10297.pdf

They are asking for public opinion but seems like the major fee increases are for the forms that are not the most filed. The most common form I765 only sees a fee increase of $30, N400 $45, I90 $90, I130 $115. These four forms constitute half of all the petitions they receive in a year. So a very small group would object to crazy increases like in the N600 case. Almost certain the new fees will go in effect for the next fiscal maybe with a change or two.

Edited May 5, 2016 by charmander

[bigjailerman 318]

I vote for a moratorium!

[akihon 129]

$1,170 for N-400

US Citizenship should be given out free!

N-600 you mean. Also, citizenship is a privilege for immigrants, not a given.

[charmander 692]

N-600 you mean. Also, citizenship is a privilege for immigrants, not a given.

Yes but you have to justify how the increase is justified. You could make N400 filing fee $50,000, then good luck finding someone filing for N400s without asking for a fee waiver.

I can't find all historical fees but as far as I found here are the historical N400 fees excluding biometric fees:

1997...$95

2003...$188

2005...$320

2007...$595 (number of applications surged before this fee was in effect)

2016...$640 (Proposed)

I don't know what is a good way to reflect these numbers in 2016 dollars but I looked for fee waiver statistics only found for one quarter of FY 2011. In 2011, USCIS received 750 thousand N400 petitions total and granted 23000 fee waivers in that particular quarter (March-May 2011), extending it to the whole year, about 12% of the N400 applicants are getting fee waivers. Increasing fees to 640$ + biometric won't hurt too much but if you increase it further then more and more people would be asking for fee waivers, in the end they have to establish a nice balance. You can't discourage people from filing from naturalization at the same time you can't lose money at an agency funded by filing fees.