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Filing for Green Card Under the November Visa Bulletin | New Procedure

On Behalf of | Nov 4, 2015 | Adjustment of Status, Podcasts, Visa Issues |

Transcript of Episode 4 of our US Citizenship and Immigration Podcast on Itunes. Check it out and subscribe!

“Hello. Welcome to Episode Four of the Lee & Garasia Immigration Podcast. Thanks for joining us.

Two New Visa Bulletins

Today I want to talk about the new visa bulletins and what the practical implications are for people today. Last October, the Department of State came out with a new visa bulletin that was broken up in two different categories. The first chart is called Application Final Action Dates and the second chart is called Dates for Filing Family or Employment Based Visa Applications. To keep it simple, I want to call this second chart the “Adjustment of Status Filing Chart” because that’s what it means. Basically, if you’re in the United States, you’re looking to file for adjustment of status, you can potentially look at this second chart. It’s going to be good news for a lot of people because the dates on this second chart are going to be much quicker than the dates on the first chart.

What was all the controversy that was going on for the last couple of weeks? When the Department of State first came out with the chart, the dates on the Adjustment of Status Filing Chart were much quicker than the dates on the first chart, Application Final Action Dates. However, the Department of State came out with a revised October bulletin that, for a lot of categories, for people from Mexico, China, India, and the Philippines, the dates had actually, unfortunately, gone back. For some people, they were not able to file their Adjustment of Status Applications as they had originally planned. Obviously, it was very upsetting. They tried to file a lawsuit, but unfortunately, the lawsuit didn’t go through, and we’re stuck with these revised dates, which haven’t changed in the November Visa Bulletin.

New Procedure for November

Starting this November, there is going to be a new procedure. The new procedure is that, especially if you’re not somebody who is going to be an immediate relative (if you are an immediate relative of a US citizen, for example, you don’t need to look at these charts)….if you are a preference-based relative or an employment-based type of person, then definitely, you want to pay attention to the Adjustment of Status Filing Chart. The very first thing you have to do is you have to go onto the uscis.gov website first. [http://www.uscis.gov/visabulletininfo] You have to make sure that USCIS is allowing you to submit your application under the second chart. Every month USCIS will determine how many visas are available and they will publicly announce whether you can follow the first chart, which is called Application Final Action Dates Chart or the second chart, which is called Dates For Filing Visa Applications or, again, just to keep the terminology simple, Adjustment of Status Filing Chart. Luckily, for November, the Adjustment of Status Filing Chart is acceptable. That’s good news for a lot of people because the dates are much quicker than they are compared to the first chart.

Hope you learned something today. If you have any questions, you can always give us a call at our office. The phone number is 732-516-0049 or you can visit us on the website. Website is www.njimmigrationattorney.com. Please remember that this is not legal advice. If you need legal advice, you need to consult with an immigration attorney to discuss your situation in detail.

Thanks for listening. We’ll talk to you soon.”

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