VJ Timeline Estimated Approval Calculation Method Updated

[bszoom42 0]

Oops! I will fix it later! :-p

Can someone validate what I am thinking... Since the USCIS has "temporarily" had some lags (which they have corrected now for most forms) in data entry of the forms (late NOA dates versus received date) I should account for this in the estimation algorithm. One possible way is that if the NOA1 date is greater than two weeks after the "sent" date then to fall back on the algrithm that used the "sent" dates. This would probably catch most of the situations where the NOA1 date was delayed and and provide a way to maintain accuracy is those events.

Thoughts? Since the NOA dating will be returning to normal (and historically and in the future I assume) they track processing off the NOA1 date themself, it seems like the right thing to do. This seems like a good stop gap measure. The two week figure is just off the top of my head. Any other conditions you think may help to refine this are appreciated .

To me, that sounds too complicated. The reason why USCIS provides the RECEIVED date is to handle issues like delayed receipting or reprinted receipting. The RECEIVED date never changes, and it is the date USCIS uses to file the applications.

All the applications of a RECEIVED date are all filed together (per region, i belive) to be pulled at a later time.

Your notice date has no impact at all on the process as far as USCIS is concerned, so why should we concern ourselves about it?

[bszoom42 0]

Please read my above post and tell me what you think. The delay in NOA date printing was temporary and not how the USCIS always works. Historically they tracked case processing time off the NOA date. The receipt date being honored policy is a temporary phenominon since applications temporarily had late NOA print dates. To correct for this see my post above where I suggest that people with NOA1 dates greater than two weeks after the Sent date have the algorithm default back to using the "sent date" method which would likely be as or more valid.

Thoughts?

I don't believe the RECEIVED date is just a temporary measure. It has been always in place, and that is how they deal with it. In situations where there is no receipting delay or no reprinting; sure the notice date will be close enough to the received date so that it will not make any difference.

Anyway, I would just like to say that these arguments aside; the timelines you are providing contain a wealth of data, and I want to make it clear I am very appreciative of everything you are doing. In the end, whatever way is better for you works for me.

Thanks!

[Captain Ewok 1,891]

Historically I think the NOA1 date is what they sorted applications by however. Please someone correct me if I am wrong. The NOA1 date was historically the same day or maybe one day later than the received day. They were typically nearly identical.

[Captain Ewok 1,891]

Please read my above post and tell me what you think. The delay in NOA date printing was temporary and not how the USCIS always works. Historically they tracked case processing time off the NOA date. The receipt date being honored policy is a temporary phenominon since applications temporarily had late NOA print dates. To correct for this see my post above where I suggest that people with NOA1 dates greater than two weeks after the Sent date have the algorithm default back to using the "sent date" method which would likely be as or more valid.

Thoughts?

I don't believe the RECEIVED date is just a temporary measure. It has been always in place, and that is how they deal with it. In situations where there is no receipting delay or no reprinting; sure the notice date will be close enough to the received date so that it will not make any difference.

Anyway, I would just like to say that these arguments aside; the timelines you are providing contain a wealth of data, and I want to make it clear I am very appreciative of everything you are doing. In the end, whatever way is better for you works for me.

Thanks!

Thanks! I too just want to make them work as efficiently as possible. If using the NOA date is not the right thing then I can default back to the "sent date". I can then add the "received date" to the timeline entry system and use that in the future .

[PlatyPius 5]

Historically I think the NOA1 date is what they sorted applications by however. Please someone correct me if I am wrong. The NOA1 date was historically the same day or maybe one day later than the received day. They were typically nearly identical.

You are correct. Changing it to received date to accomodate a temporary measure would be silly. In fact, people worrying too much about all of this is silly. It is only an ESTIMATE. If your estimated date here changes, it doesn't affect USCIS at all. ####### happens. Everyone should stop obsessing about these estimated dates and just start preparing for the arrival of their SO/the move to be with their SO. Worrying about the estimated dates causes people to ignore other things, causes far too much stress, and is just silly.

It'll go through when it goes through. Worry about other stuff, like where you're going to stash your Star Wars action figure collection before your SO arrives.

[bszoom42 0]

Hmm, Let me make sure we are using the right terms.

Let Date#1 be the date the petiton was sent.

Let Date#2 be the date the delivery company (USPS, Fedex, etc.) delivered the petiton.

Let Date#3 be the RECEIVED DATE on the Notice of Action form.

Let Date#4 be the NOTICE DATE on the Notice of Action form

Let Date#5 be the date the Notice of Action form arrived in your mailbox.

And I will use my dates as examples.

Date #1 = May 9th (date the petiton was sent)

Date #2 = May 10th (date that USPS delivered the petition)

Date #3 = May 10th (RECEIVED DATE on the Notice of Action form) - date USCIS prioritizes and files by

Date #4 = May 12th (NOTICE DATE on the Notice of Action form) - date that this Notice of Action was physically printed

Date #5 = May 17th (Notice of Action arrived in my postal mailbox)

My argument would simply be - lets put the Date #3 (RECEIVED DATE) as the NOA1 date on the timeline.

For NOA2, the date that should be used is the first date of petition validity.

Here's a prior post I have made detailing this with pictures to help. (Also, please note RECEIPT date is not the same as RECEIVED date.)

With the I-797C (NOA1) and I-797 (NOA2) there are a bunch of dates that makes it confusing.

NOTICE DATE is the date the physical paper (I-797 or I-797C) was printed, and is basically irrelevant to your Visa Process.

On the I-797C (NOA1), the RECEIVED DATE is the date your petition is prioritized by. That is the date that should be entered in the VisaJourney.com timeline. The NOTICE DATE is simply the date your I-797C was printed.

On the I-797 (NOA2), the date that is important is the first date listed in the date range of the petition Validity. For example, "Valid from 07/09/2007 to 11/09/2007" means that 07/09/2007 is the NOA2 date. That is the date that should be entered in the VisaJourney.com timeline. The RECEIPT DATE is simply the date your most recent I-797C (NOA1) was printed; and the NOTICE DATE is simply the date your most recent I-797 (NOA2) was printed.

Here's a picture of my I-797C (NOA1). I have circled the RECEIVED DATE in red.

Here's a picture of my I-797 (NOA2). I have circled the VALID FROM date in red.

[bszoom42 0]

You are correct. Changing it to received date to accomodate a temporary measure would be silly. In fact, people worrying too much about all of this is silly. It is only an ESTIMATE. If your estimated date here changes, it doesn't affect USCIS at all. ####### happens. Everyone should stop obsessing about these estimated dates and just start preparing for the arrival of their SO/the move to be with their SO. Worrying about the estimated dates causes people to ignore other things, causes far too much stress, and is just silly.

It'll go through when it goes through. Worry about other stuff, like where you're going to stash your Star Wars action figure collection before your SO arrives.

I disagree that this is being changed for a temporary measure. I submit that this has been in place all the while. That being said, I grant this this is fairly technical stuff with a difference being negligible for most people; so whatever Captain wants to do is fine by me.

I am just providing information for technical accuracy - It is not up to me to decide what is reasonable to actually implement; and frankly, we are getting a ton of value out of what we have so far, so i am very thankful for what we have.

[totes 0]

Historically I think the NOA1 date is what they sorted applications by however. Please someone correct me if I am wrong. The NOA1 date was historically the same day or maybe one day later than the received day. They were typically nearly identical.

You are correct. Changing it to received date to accomodate a temporary measure would be silly. In fact, people worrying too much about all of this is silly. It is only an ESTIMATE. If your estimated date here changes, it doesn't affect USCIS at all. ####### happens. Everyone should stop obsessing about these estimated dates and just start preparing for the arrival of their SO/the move to be with their SO. Worrying about the estimated dates causes people to ignore other things, causes far too much stress, and is just silly.

It'll go through when it goes through. Worry about other stuff, like where you're going to stash your Star Wars action figure collection before your SO arrives.

Then why not just remove it all together?????

Everything I have read on USC's website indicates that they hold themselves accountable by "received" date which makes perfect sense. "sent" date makes no sense to me in terms of estimating a date that your petition may be adjudicated since as stated before, it obviously cannot be in process if it has not been received. NOA date is just the day the form was printed. If they send you another one, because you didn't get the first one, the date will change to the date they printed the second one. So in that case, does my NOA date change in my timeline? The only thing that is consistent is "received" date.

My 2 cents.

[no name 1]

Then why not just remove it all together?????

It would certainly cut down on the hysteria every time the date changes.

Edited September 4, 2007 by devilette

[Chris Parker 11]

The delay in NOA date printing was temporary and not how the USCIS always works.

Its been fairly common for the last year. USCIS is almost giving weekly updates in their press release section to show again and again how they are failing to meet their target compliance for issuing their NOA1 (target compliance is to issue NOA1 within 30 days of receiving the case). Some service centers, such as California, have routinely not issued NOA1 until the maximum 30 days after receiving. Also, service centers are commonly transferring files from one service center to the other to optimize adjudication as part of the USCIS "Bi-Specialization initiative."

In particular, CSC is processing most I-129F and family I-130's right now, even if they are mailed to another Service center as required by the instructions. In my case, I mailed I-130 to Vermont, but NOA1 came from California with a WSC receipt #.

For all of these reasons, I don't think it is a temporary phenomenon, or there wouldn't even be a "RECEIVED DATE" on the 2002 NOA1 sample you showed.

Historically they tracked case processing time off the NOA date. The receipt date being honored policy is a temporary phenominon since applications temporarily had late NOA print dates.

More accurately, historically the NOA1 was generated on or about the received date, which is why we erroneously came to refer to the NOA1 date as the received date (Vermont's NOA's also called the received date as "Receipt Date" to confuse matters further). We should have been using Received Date all along. We should start using it now.

To correct for this see my post above where I suggest that people with NOA1 dates greater than two weeks after the Sent date have the algorithm default back to using the "sent date" method which would likely be as or more valid.

I think that solution is the most complicated to implement and will provide the least consistent results. As it is right now, the timelines are not accurate because nobody knows for sure what NOA1 date means (I used received date for mine, some other people might be using notice date, so the cases can't be easily properly compared).

Instead I'd suggest we just change "NOA1 date" in the timeline entry form and grid to "Received Date" and compute the calculation from that date. Everyone will know what date to enter. Regardless of whether NOA1 is timely or not, the estimate will perform the same calculation. Also, it is the easiest fix for you to do too!

Edited September 4, 2007 by Chris Parker

[Chris Parker 11]

Historically I think the NOA1 date is what they sorted applications by however. Please someone correct me if I am wrong. The NOA1 date was historically the same day or maybe one day later than the received day. They were typically nearly identical.

I think the applications are sorted by "Priority Date" and always have been.

For immediate relative petitions, such as spouse/fiancee of USC, and applications for other benefits such as employment authorization, travel documents, condition removal, and naturalization, the priority date is always the same as received date, which is why they sometimes don't even print a priority date as in your sample. Again, it is RECEIVED DATE that counts, and the same received date appears even on NOA2 above the Notice Date (NOA2's "Notice Date" is the approval date as far as I can tell).

[Captain Ewok 1,891]

I can add another field for the "received date" and once people start using it more we can default to it possibly. I am running some stats to see how much sent-->NOA1 dates have changed over time. I will post the results in a second.

Texas:

California:

Nebraska:

Vermont:

[Captain Ewok 1,891]

I should note that I will be adding the above sent-->NOA1 images to the timeline stats page as they seems very useful .

[Chris Parker 11]

I should note that I will be adding the above sent-->NOA1 images to the timeline stats page as they seems very useful .

They really just confirm what we've been telling you. The NOA1 date doesn't mean anything in the big picture of processing the case. Sent->NOA1 date increases while NOA1->NOA2 date decreases. Overall case processing time remains unchanged. Everyone is confused, like USCIS wants it to be.

The Sent->NOA1 is useful to me only in the sense that during that 40 days after I mailed the I-130, I started getting very concerned that the petition had just been totally lost or was being rejected, since I had neither a NOA1 nor was the package returned by USCIS nor had the check been cashed (yes, since my petition got loaded onto the freight truck while they were cleaning out Vermont to send it all to California, it was California that finally deposited the check some 40 days later).

Finally, we trust you to make the best judgment on how to resolve this issue. The final decision is of course yours. I think you have all the facts straight now. In any case, thank you for providing us with all these excellent resources and forums here on VisaJourney.com

Edited September 4, 2007 by Chris Parker

[Captain Ewok 1,891]

One good note is while the sent-->NOA1 times seem to be increasing, it seems as though they were all trending smoothly over time. Basically this means that while not perfect the "sent" date may end up being reasonable to use for estimates. The reason in moving to the NOA1 date (or even received date) was that there was thought to be a great deal of variability in the sent--> NOA1 dates do to mailing. This appears not to be the case.