N-400 January 2017 Filers

[feroze895 47]

12 hours ago, jayu said:

New statistical data is out. The backlog has increased Jan-Mar.

 

How come the approval rate is only 58%

[Deribas_Alma-Ata 32]

17 hours ago, ank said:

I disagree that all terrorists are Muslim.I mean there might be a few who follow other religions. 

I'm sorry man, I did not want to offend you. It's just a joke that I've heard.

And since I don't practice any religion I don't take it serious anyways... Please don't get me wrong, I believe in God, I don't believe in religion

[NJ_NJ 5]

22 hours ago, Nana098 said:

Hi, again @NJ_NJ no update? We still in line for interview. On Monday 5, My daughter had her interview, everything was good, except the waiting time, we spent 6 hours there, her appt. was at 9 am, was called 11am, interview took just 15 minutes and wait until 2 pm for oath, we left around 3 pm.

So be prepared to spend the whole day there

Hi @Nana098 - Still no update. Same status since February 3rd. I will start worrying about it if I don't hear anything by the end of the month.

Thanks for the sharing your daughter's experience. 

[MyJourney 276]

18 hours ago, Bugs said:

While that is an extreme example and probably has more to do with Ahmed's particular case than anything else, most processing times are affected by which field office they are in.  Some field offices have more applications to deal with, less workforce, more other application types to deal with, etc.  Could be anything really.  You can usually get a good idea of how long your particular field office will take from looking at recent VJ member processing times for that field office.

I do not think so. I have been here for a while to make enough observations. You may argue that it may have to do with "Ahmed's particular case", but if you do then you have to admit that Harry's case is also "particular". The average Kumars are sitting here and wondering what is so "particular" about Harry. Do you see my point?

Edited June 9, 2017 by MyJourney

[purplepretzel 35]

9 hours ago, feroze895 said:

How come the approval rate is only 58%

Most likely because of the backlog. The other applications have not been processed yet.

[ank 17]

6 hours ago, Deribas_Alma-Ata said:

I'm sorry man, I did not want to offend you. It's just a joke that I've heard.

And since I don't practice any religion I don't take it serious anyways... Please don't get me wrong, I believe in God, I don't believe in religion

Well, I  follow Hinduism. So, personally you do not offend me. But, I am following this website for last 3 years. I got so much help from all the people here that I cant express in words. I never read any offending statements from anyone in my visa journey so far  which will end on June 22. 

I know your comments were casual in nature.  You are good person. 

 

Long Live VisaJourney!   

[Deribas_Alma-Ata 32]

12 minutes ago, ank said:

Well, I  follow Hinduism. So, personally you do not offend me. But, I am following this website for last 3 years. I got so much help from all the people here that I cant express in words. I never read any offending statements from anyone in my visa journey so far  which will end on June 22. 

I know your comments were casual in nature.  You are good person. 

 

Long Live VisaJourney!   

Thank you for understanding!  Honestly, before I never followed any immigration forums at all cause before everything was nice and smooth. And I agree with you people here are so helpful and sharing their success stories that cheers me up a lot. Have a great Friday!

[ruby_2 4]

6 hours ago, MyJourney said:

I do not think so. I have been here for a while to make enough observations. You may argue that it may have to do with "Ahmed's particular case", but if you do then you have to admit that Harry's case is also "particular". The average Kumars are sitting here and wondering what is so "particular" about Harry. Do you see my point?

Agree.  But here is mind-boggling observation that I noticed (same in other site as well),  the N400 applicants who filed ONLINE in 2017 have only 3-4 months complete processing time (up until approval or oath taking).  I read somewhere from one forum posting that USCIS starting this 2017, has tried to stream line the length of time on online N400 applicants so this could explain the speedy processing of 2017 ONLINE applicants. Not all applicants can avail the N400 online application in their 2017 set up.

Edited June 9, 2017 by ruby_2

[MyJourney 276]

You may argue that those quickies are so because they submitted their applications online. However, again, there are ton of quickies who did not apply online and there are a lot of online applicants who are sitting and waiting too.
We more or less understand why some applications can take longer to process, but we have absolutely no idea why some applications are processed so fast, while others and sit and rot waiting with no explanation whatsoever.

[jayu 21]

6 hours ago, purplepretzel said:

Most likely because of the backlog. The other applications have not been processed yet.

How did you arrive to 58%?

The approval rate has been around 90% for several years.

Edited June 9, 2017 by jayu

[jayu 21]

20 hours ago, ruby_2 said:

I don't doubt that for the simple reason: big federal budget cut.  Take for example my local FO, from what I read about their office info their hours of operation are 4 days only for less than 8 hours work per day (8AM-3PM). So, this explains a long wait of movement of N400 applications. Ughhhhh

Budget cut cannot be the reason for delays. Government funds are appropriated to USCIS before the start of fiscal year. Appropriated funds cannot be taken away. 

If citizenship applications continuously increase, and appropriations remain the same (same number of officers), how do you not expect a delay?

Given that the number of applicants almost doubled compared to previous years, I am surprised that USCIS is processing cases so fast!

[Bugs 455]

7 hours ago, MyJourney said:

I do not think so. I have been here for a while to make enough observations. You may argue that it may have to do with "Ahmed's particular case", but if you do then you have to admit that Harry's case is also "particular". The average Kumars are sitting here and wondering what is so "particular" about Harry. Do you see my point?

No doubt there are outliers.  

 

But it isn't as completely random as you portray it to be.  2 years wait time is so out of the ordinary that you have to look past it as being an outlier and conclude that there is something particular about his case causing the extreme delay, whether it is because of a holdup on background check, a RFE that isn't getting completed, you name it.  At that point, Ahmed needs to get an info pass ASAP and get to the bottom of the holdup, as by 2 years, it is unlikely a field office worker that is the cause of the holdup and more likely something specific to Ahmed's case.

 

However, when you are talking 2-3 months to 10 months, you do see some people getting processed faster than others, it usually has to do with the field offices.  It doesn't take much research on VJ timelines to learn which field offices process faster than others.  You can easily see trends and patterns.  With some field offices, you see most people getting processed in just 3-4 months.  Some you see most people getting processed in 10 months.  So one can make an educated GUESS as to when to expect to see an interview letter/interview based on such.

 

Does that mean EVERYONE at that particular field office will be processed in exactly that time frame?  No.  Like I say, there are outliers by a month or two on either end, and this usually has to to with the number of caseloads each agent is assigned at each stage, from the fingerprint/background check to the field office.  

 

A USCIS agent came on VJ several years ago and held a Q&A, explaining the process.  Agents do not work together on one application at a time to ensure everybody is kept in order in line.  Instead, agents are assigned bulks.  Some get done with their bulk faster than others, and grab the next bulk, putting those in that new bulk ahead of those being processed by another agent.  Also, even within the bulk, not everyone is kept in order.  Some applications get processed faster because they have zero red flags or RFEs, while some get put on hold due to needing to clear up flags before moving on.  Also, agents get sick, take a day off, some get reassigned to help in another department for a few days, etc.  But the bulk stays on their desk.  

 

THIS is why outliers occur.

 

However, extremely long cases like Ahmed's are extremely rare for it to be a result of this, unless it gets lost.  Usually it is due to a holdup on something specific with Ahmed's case.

[Bugs 455]

In regards to your field office, thankfully there are several VJers from recent months, going back to the last few months of 2016, who have N-400s going to the Denver field office, giving us a good picture of current processing times there.  Most are seeing their wait time from the time the application was mailed to their interview date as being approximately 7 months, with nobody who mailed it in from December onwards yet receiving an interview letter.  This means that, if you are a January filer, expect to have an interview in or around August, meaning that you should expect to see your interview letter in or around July.

[weakheart 118]

On 6/8/2017 at 11:51 AM, jayu said:

New statistical data is out. The backlog has increased Jan-Mar.

 

Looking at this data though, it is very disappointing

for instance at my field office july 1 applicants are becoming citizen on march 31, which is 9 months processing, however I applied in January 2017 not july 2016, and by january according to above chart pending applications got 50% increase(approval no.s are still the same), which means normal processing which was 9 months for july 2016 applicants is definitely going to be more than 9 months... which is freaking me out, i hope i am wrong though 

[weakheart 118]

Also i want to add, in our January fillers one of the first person who got interview letter was a government employee, i do know military people get preference too, so i still think one of the first few ones who were very quick were outliers based on whatever preference they had, all i know by this point is i was not one of those few, however people getting letters in last 2 months I believe are based on field office speeds, as i have seen some field offices are more than 3 months faster than mine and i am talking about july 2016 applicants, i am sure slowers probably got more behind by January 2017