EB2-3 Predictions (Rather Calculations) - 2013

[Spectator]

I think there will be a possibility of some FB spillover next year. I was looking at the interview schedule for F2A at Mumbai consulate and I see only 2 interviews scheduled for this month(which seems too low compared to usual). But many people (based on other forums) are waiting for their I-130 to get approved or their case is still processing at NVC.
CO might have made F2A current little too late. 2 months is not enough time for USCIS to approve I-130 and processing to be done at NVC. Though CO said in the last bulletin that demand is getting built up nicely, I suspect there will be a few thousand visas wasted in FB and turn out as EB spillover for next FY.

gc_soon,

I also think that is possible. Good thinking to have a look by the way.

Fall Down also exists in FB and CO moved all the dates forward for September.

What do the interviews look like for other Categories?

Bear in mind, if you are looking at Indian Consulate Interview dates, that over 70% of FB visas approved for India are in FB4. India doesn't use huge numbers in any other Categories.

Spare F2A visas would fall to F2B, then F3, then F4, then F1.

It's possible Indian interview numbers may not reveal if other Categories are using extra visas for this reason.

I'm not sure if it would get that far, but Mexico and Philippines both have much earlier Cut Off Dates in F2B, F3, F4 and F1 than all other Countries.

I do agree CO made his date movements too late (for all Categories) this year.

[vizcard]

I think there will be a possibility of some FB spillover next year. I was looking at the interview schedule for F2A at Mumbai consulate and I see only 2 interviews scheduled for this month(which seems too low compared to usual). But many people (based on other forums) are waiting for their I-130 to get approved or their case is still processing at NVC.
CO might have made F2A current little too late. 2 months is not enough time for USCIS to approve I-130 and processing to be done at NVC. Though CO said in the last bulletin that demand is getting built up nicely, I suspect there will be a few thousand visas wasted in FB and turn out as EB spillover for next FY.

FB usage doesn't typically come from India. Its China, Phillipines, etc. that have the bulk.

[Spectator]

FB usage doesn't typically come from India. Its China, Phillipines, etc. that have the bulk.

Not forgetting Dominican Republic and Vietnam.

India came in at number 6 for overall FB usage in FY2012 and number 2 for F4 use.

[qesehmk]

How about mexico? That's the big one.

Not forgetting Dominican Republic and Vietnam.

[Spectator]

How about mexico? That's the big one.

I thought that was a given. Even viz didn't mention them.

The largest source of FB visas to EB this year was reduced use in F2A by Mexico last year.

My guess is that a large number of those are already in the USA and didn't want to leave to get the waiver, hoping that CIR would regularize their presence here, or waiting for the change where the waiver could be processed while they remained in the USA.

I have no information to back that up. It may well be 1 + 1 = 3

[kd2008]

I thought that was a given. Even viz didn't mention them.

The largest source of FB visas to EB this year was reduced use in F2A by Mexico last year.

My guess is that a large number of those are already in the USA and didn't want to leave to get the waiver, hoping that CIR would regularize their presence here, or waiting for the change where the waiver could be processed while they remained in the USA.

I have no information to back that up. It may well be 1 + 1 = 3

Spec,

Spillover from FB is expected next year in my opinion because F2A is current but its processing is super slow at USCIS. These are the dates from USCIS:

https://egov.uscis.gov/cris/processTimesDisplayInit.do

Field Office Processing Dates for California Service Center as of: June 30, 2013

I-130 Petition for Alien Relative Permanent resident filling for a spouse or child under 21 November 15, 2011

Field Office Processing Dates for Vermont Service Center as of: June 30, 2013

I-130 Petition for Alien Relative Permanent resident filling for a spouse or child under 21 June 4, 2012

Cases after these dates may have been processed but in general it indicates very slow processing by USCIS. So even after making F2A current, I think it may not generate a whole lot of demand. So there will be lot of unused numbers in this category.

Now whether this gets used through Fall down to other FB categories or be transferred to EB categories remains to be seen.

CO talked about setting a cut off date for F2A in October. this may imply that demand is greater than 1/12 of the quota after making dates current but it may not have been enough to use all of FY13 quota.

[Pedro Gonzales]

Pedro,

I use a factor of I-485 per Primary applicant for EB2 of 2.05 as that is about the figure the DHS statistics give on a consistent basis.

The figures for each of the Categories for the last 3 years are:

------ FY2012 -- FY2011 -- FY2010
EB1 ---- 2.41 ---- 2.37 ---- 2.40
EB2 ---- 2.06 ---- 1.99 ---- 2.06
EB3 ---- 2.22 ---- 2.36 ---- 2.37
EB4 ---- 1.61 ---- 1.72 ---- 1.83
EB5 ---- 2.87 ---- 2.90 ---- 2.85

Previous years are very similar.

While the ratios may be different for particular Countries, there is no data available to split it down further.

Thanks Spec. It is possible that due to the consulting model, EB3I are generally older than EB3ROW and so have more kids when they first come here. In any case my sample set of 10 is too small to make reasonable conclusions from.

[Spectator]

Spec,

Spillover from FB is expected next year in my opinion because F2A is current but its processing is super slow at USCIS. These are the dates from USCIS:

https://egov.uscis.gov/cris/processTimesDisplayInit.do

Field Office Processing Dates for California Service Center as of: June 30, 2013

I-130 Petition for Alien Relative Permanent resident filling for a spouse or child under 21 November 15, 2011

Field Office Processing Dates for Vermont Service Center as of: June 30, 2013

I-130 Petition for Alien Relative Permanent resident filling for a spouse or child under 21 June 4, 2012

Cases after these dates may have been processed but in general it indicates very slow processing by USCIS. So even after making F2A current, I think it may not generate a whole lot of demand. So there will be lot of unused numbers in this category.

Now whether this gets used through Fall down to other FB categories or be transferred to EB categories remains to be seen.

CO talked about setting a cut off date for F2A in October. this may imply that demand is greater than 1/12 of the quota after making dates current but it may not have been enough to use all of FY13 quota.

kd2008,

Two points.

a) The vast majority of F2A are Consular Processed, so USCIS processing times are largely irrelevant.

b) Other Categories in FB can benefit from SO and CO has also advanced them more quickly than normal.

Since DOS carries out most of their processing in advance, cases can be brought to interview stage and visa issuance relatively quickly. Even if F2A Demand cannot be ramped up quickly enough, there are plenty of CP cases in other FB Categories ready to take up the slack if time permits.

I do think there will be some extra visas from FB next year, but i don't think it will be even close to the number seen this year.

[gc_soon]

kd2008,
a) The vast majority of F2A are Consular Processed, so USCIS processing times are largely irrelevant.
.

Spec, Just a minor correction: Since USCIS processes I-130 and the problem is the processing times for both CSC and VSC are still stuck way behind, so unfortunately many F2A applicants cannot take advantage of the fact that they are current since according to USCIS their I30 petition is still within processing time(national avg as per the dashboard for F2A is 18 months). From the forums elsewhere there are many F2A I130 filers with PDs in 2011 still waiting for I130 approval. Fromt eh dashboard (http://dashboard.uscis.gov/) there are about 500K pending I130 (although not sure how much of it is for F2A which is current). The trend shows the fairly increasing number of pending apps. I guess there are tons of "hidden" demand in Family category because of slow USCIS processing - the fast movement of dates for F2A is misleading at best.

[Jagan01]

kd2008,

Two points.

a) The vast majority of F2A are Consular Processed, so USCIS processing times are largely irrelevant.

b) Other Categories in FB can benefit from SO and CO has also advanced them more quickly than normal.

Since DOS carries out most of their processing in advance, cases can be brought to interview stage and visa issuance relatively quickly. Even if F2A Demand cannot be ramped up quickly enough, there are plenty of CP cases in other FB Categories ready to take up the slack if time permits.

I do think there will be some extra visas from FB next year, but i don't think it will be even close to the number seen this year.

1. 2014 is the last fiscal year when we can expect some spillover from FB. Post 2014 there will be none.
2. I went back until 2008 and did not see any occasion when EB visas were unused. So that wont be the case this time as well.
3. FB has never been made current in the past. Hence this move of making it current will hurt EB post FY14.
4. The only times we have had good spillover from FB was when dates in F2a were 4 years in the past. Also it has been steadily in 2011 and hence for may, june, july, bulletins and hence demand must have been built up already.

[iamsheshu]

My PD is Nov 2008 EB2 India, Any idea when can I expect dates to be current ?

[vizcard]

My PD is Nov 2008 EB2 India, Any idea when can I expect dates to be current ?

Next summer

[Spectator]

Spec, Just a minor correction: Since USCIS processes I-130 and the problem is the processing times for both CSC and VSC are still stuck way behind, so unfortunately many F2A applicants cannot take advantage of the fact that they are current since according to USCIS their I30 petition is still within processing time(national avg as per the dashboard for F2A is 18 months). From the forums elsewhere there are many F2A I130 filers with PDs in 2011 still waiting for I130 approval. Fromt eh dashboard (http://dashboard.uscis.gov/) there are about 500K pending I130 (although not sure how much of it is for F2A which is current). The trend shows the fairly increasing number of pending apps. I guess there are tons of "hidden" demand in Family category because of slow USCIS processing - the fast movement of dates for F2A is misleading at best.

Perhaps I didn't phrase it very well. I was referring to USCIS processing an I-485.

There's zero chance of a newly submitted F2A application being approved this year. It typically takes USCIS at least 6 months to approve the I-130.

The forward movement of the COD in August was nearly two years and a good number of the cases that became Current would already have an approved I-130 and be ready to proceed.

If Mexico is again the problem with F2A ,then there will be no shortage of applicants from other Countries prepared to proceed.

The question is more whether sufficient cases can be brought to the interview and visa issuance stage. Possibly not.

I think CO was completely caught out by F2A last year. That is not entirely the case this year, even though I do think he acted too late for all the visas to be used by the FB Categories.

[justvisiting]

The PERM slowdown has reached more than 180 days. For comparison, this time last year a PERM was taking about 60 days. This will slow down EB2-ROW considerably for next year. There is essentially a 4 month gap of normal EB2-ROW demand at this point (PDs in Feb, Mar, Apr, May)... these are folks who would have normally filed concurrent I-140/I-485 by now, but have not. USCIS has probably dried up their EB2-ROW pipeline: this is why 485 processing times seem to have improved.

[iamsheshu]

Next summer

Thanks for your reply.

[vizcard]

The PERM slowdown has reached more than 180 days. For comparison, this time last year a PERM was taking about 60 days. This will slow down EB2-ROW considerably for next year. There is essentially a 4 month gap of normal EB2-ROW demand at this point (PDs in Feb, Mar, Apr, May)... these are folks who would have normally filed concurrent I-140/I-485 by now, but have not. USCIS has probably dried up their EB2-ROW pipeline: this is why 485 processing times seem to have improved.

Downside to this is that if the processing time picks up, you now have a scenario like this year where EB2WW consumes more than normal.

[RogerFederer]

My PD is Nov 2008 EB2 India, Any idea when can I expect dates to be current ?

There is still a chance that dates can move further another 5 months. In that case they may retrogress later. If you get lucky, its urs. Reason being - perm slow down, approvals eb2I are not 100% etc. VB said eb1 & eb2 slowed down don't know how much. If there are visa wasted this year, it does not makes sense to me if they don't move them to october.

I'm being very optimistic and always enjoyed posts when they said there is still a chance.
So let's think about the chances you have, have couple of beers tonight since you had a good news :-)

[Pedro Gonzales]

There is still a chance that dates can move further another 5 months. In that case they may retrogress later. If you get lucky, its urs. Reason being - perm slow down, approvals eb2I are not 100% etc. VB said eb1 & eb2 slowed down don't know how much. If there are visa wasted this year, it does not makes sense to me if they don't move them to october.

I'm being very optimistic and always enjoyed posts when they said there is still a chance.
So let's think about the chances you have, have couple of beers tonight since you had a good news :-)

You're raising false hopes. Here's why:
1) The PERM slowdown has been going on for months now, CO knew how much EB2ROW FA to assume (EB1 is not affected by the PERM slowdown) when he released the September VB.
2) If there is a wastage of visas this year (which, while a possibility, most here don't believe will happen), it will be because of a bottleneck in processing application, not in the availability of approvable applications.
3) A potential wastage of visas this year has no bearing on the COD in the October bulletin. Except for 2012, CO has not shown an inclination to issue quarterly spillover, so the regular 250 visas per month is all that will be available to EB2I starting in October, and there will be sufficient EB3 to EB2 Porting to account for those numbers.

Dates are going to retrogress or at best stay constant. They will not move forward until the next spillover kicks in next summer.

[Spectator]

You're raising false hopes. Here's why:
1) The PERM slowdown has been going on for months now, CO knew how much EB2ROW FA to assume (EB1 is not affected by the PERM slowdown) when he released the September VB.
2) If there is a wastage of visas this year (which, while a possibility, most here don't believe will happen), it will be because of a bottleneck in processing application, not in the availability of approvable applications.
3) A potential wastage of visas this year has no bearing on the COD in the October bulletin. Except for 2012, CO has not shown an inclination to issue quarterly spillover, so the regular 250 visas per month is all that will be available to EB2I starting in October, and there will be sufficient EB3 to EB2 Porting to account for those numbers.

Dates are going to retrogress or at best stay constant. They will not move forward until the next spillover kicks in next summer.

I'd also add, as it affects the beginning of the new FY, that both Trackitt and the latest USCIS Inventory show significant numbers of EB2-WW cases already awaiting final adjudication. Once September is over, USCIS will return to these applications.

[iamsheshu]

There is still a chance that dates can move further another 5 months. In that case they may retrogress later. If you get lucky, its urs. Reason being - perm slow down, approvals eb2I are not 100% etc. VB said eb1 & eb2 slowed down don't know how much. If there are visa wasted this year, it does not makes sense to me if they don't move them to october.

I'm being very optimistic and always enjoyed posts when they said there is still a chance.
So let's think about the chances you have, have couple of beers tonight since you had a good news :-)

Cool, thanks for your response. Appreciate it.

[newguy]

Hello All, I have few Questions regarding EB2 Date movement.. What made CO to move the date to May 2010 so aggressively in Nov/Dec 2011 and early 2012.. Is he not aware of Portings at that time? Is he not aware of yearly quota? Few say just to generate Demand.. i am not sure how valid is that point and ethically correct..

[IamGSN]

Hi All, I have been following this thread for quite some time, Mine is EB-2 India and PD is July 2009. Any idea when will my PD be current?

[Guest123]

Hi, My PD will be current in SEP and i have applied my 485. Currently i am travelling and will be back in the US on Sep 6th. Could you please let me know if there is anything that i should be taking care or be aware of for Sep 1st thru Sep 6th time period?

[vizcard]

Hello All, I have few Questions regarding EB2 Date movement.. What made CO to move the date to May 2010 so aggressively in Nov/Dec 2011 and early 2012.. Is he not aware of Portings at that time? Is he not aware of yearly quota? Few say just to generate Demand.. i am not sure how valid is that point and ethically correct..

The issue was that there was low demand AND low inventory. To add to that the applications didn't come in soon enough so he kept moving it further along. Now he should have used common sense and looked at historicals and even PERM data to see how much inventory he would be getting my moving x months. But you know what htey say about common sense.

Hi All, I have been following this thread for quite some time, Mine is EB-2 India and PD is July 2009. Any idea when will my PD be current?

Probably not till 2015.. unless CIR comes in to play.

Hi, My PD will be current in SEP and i have applied my 485. Currently i am travelling and will be back in the US on Sep 6th. Could you please let me know if there is anything that i should be taking care or be aware of for Sep 1st thru Sep 6th time period?

Keep an eye out to see if you are approved. If you are then you should inform the CBP official of the same when you land in the US. Otherwise theres nothing else to be done.

[vizcard]

There is still a chance that dates can move further another 5 months. In that case they may retrogress later. If you get lucky, its urs. Reason being - perm slow down, approvals eb2I are not 100% etc. VB said eb1 & eb2 slowed down don't know how much. If there are visa wasted this year, it does not makes sense to me if they don't move them to october.

I'm being very optimistic and always enjoyed posts when they said there is still a chance.
So let's think about the chances you have, have couple of beers tonight since you had a good news :-)

Dates will move ahead only in the summer or at the earliest spring 2014. There is ZERO chance of it happening before then. Drink those beers regardless