EB2-3 Predictions (Rather Calculations) 2015-2020

[Justmyself]

Thank you. Hope they don’t waste visas. We did our medicals hoping our dates would be current in the next 2 yrs.

[JoinedToAsk]

Even if there is a hidden demand, each country has a limit of 7% every year , so I would expect them not be current soon but have some date associated ( FAD) . And once they have a FAD associated - the most backlogged country India would get the extra visas available.
Hence my question can USCIS siphon the extra visa numbers away from India applicants to other countries even though they are not the most backlogged.

https://ambals.blogspot.com/ claims 90K for EB2 and 40K for EB3.

[inspired_p]

https://ambals.blogspot.com/ claims 90K for EB2 and 40K for EB3.

Yes sounds right at the optimistic end; mine was more realistic/ pessimistic prediction ( 20K visas in EB3-ROW within the US with consulates closed). Considering fall up and fall down spillover EB2 might get more visas .. depending on how many unused visas trickle down to EB2 from EB4, EB5 And EB1, EB2 very well get further more visas than the 30-40K from FB spillover.
Fingers crossed - USCIS is able to process all these this year else they will move back to FB next year and any unused FB visas this year will get added to EB next year ( which might be significant as well if COVID keeps playing havoc in consular processing)

[srimurthy]

https://ambals.blogspot.com/ claims 90K for EB2 and 40K for EB3.

I guess you have not read the below statement:
we know that, EB1, EB4 and EB5 have backlog more than the available numbers for FY2021. If the processing happens properly, all of the visas available for these categories will be used up. That means, no spill over for EB2.
So expect the 5200 (7% overall) + 25 K (horizontal and vertical spillover) = 30K for EB2I to be a good realistic number and it will be more clear where we stand by Jan.

[vsivarama]

I would NOT expect vertical spillover to EB2 at this time as there are enough backlogged cases for EB4, EB5 and EB1. EB-ROW numbers are the ones to keep in mind. Folks who are old enough to remember the 2008 financial crisis, there were no spillovers from FB to EB but EB2-I still did get some substantial (Vertical + Horizontal spillover) numbers because of decline in ROW usage. I do not believe the ROW usage would be business as usual keeping up with the numbers from 2019 in FY 2021 even with the consulates opening up. So there is more of a chance of Horizontal spillover especially for EB2-I (expecting 5-10k). Visa number wastage is the real issue though. However, I recently learned that even if 485 is not completely adjudicated, if it's far along enough in it's processing, USCIS usually does apply a visa number to the pending case to avoid wastage. I cannot speak of the intent, but there is definitely a way for USCIS to use up all the numbers. Will it do so would depend on the intent of the admin.

[Spectator]

The September 2020 CP figures have been published at https://travel.state.gov/content/dam...sa%20Class.pdf

I've posted the final analysis for the FY here.

[bluelabel]

Anyone with Eb2I priority date in 2010 received RFE for medical recently? My priority date is March 2nd 2010 and received Medical and maintenance of status since my last entry on H1 RFE in 2018 and no updates since then. My medicals are already expired as i got them done September 2018.

My EAD/AP renewal just approved last week end and this did not trigger any RFE either for medical on I-485. I never sent Supplement J as it wasn't asked in the RFE in 2018, do i need to send Supplement J if i never changed my Job after applying I-485? Will sending Supplement J voluntarily trigger a medical RFE on I-485?

[longwaitgigu]

The September 2020 CP figures have been published at https://travel.state.gov/content/dam...sa%20Class.pdf

I've posted the final analysis for the FY here.

So I guess it's safe to say
272,788 gc might be this EB 2021 limit?

[android09]

So I guess it's safe to say
272,788 gc might be this EB 2021 limit?

Bigger question is, how many will USCIS actually process and how many will it waste? We know empirically that they struggle to process 140,000 a year and in any given year, there is some wastage. Add to this construct, required visa interviews, additional RFEs, intentions and add in a pandemic situation where capacity, efficiency are not exactly optimal and not to mention dwindling operating budgets and you can imagine where we might get with this. Just as the number of spill over green cards added are historic, there is perhaps going to be visa wastage at historic proportions as well. Everyone is looking at their dates and how much the bulletins move forward, just also remember nothing has changed with regards to processing capabilities. Instead of X applications, USCIS will now need to process perhaps 1.8X applications. No additional personnel, no additional supporting vendor orgs to help process this additional workload and in fact, USCIS is sunsetting existing vendor support partners to reduce costs. Add to that, a nation wide injunction issued by the courts that stops USCIS from raising costs. I dont want to sound like an apologist for USCIS, just want everyone to be cognizant of that and have realistic expectations.

[iamdeb]

Bigger question is, how many will USCIS actually process and how many will it waste? We know empirically that they struggle to process 140,000 a year and in any given year, there is some wastage. Add to this construct required visa interviews etc, additional RFEs, intentions and add in a pandemic situation where capacity, efficiency and not to mention dwindling operating budgets and you can imagine where we might get with this. Just as the number of spill over green cards added are perhaps historic, there is perhaps going to be visa wastage at historic proportions as well. Everyone is looking at their dates and how much the bulletins move forward, just also remember nothing has changed with regards to processing capabilities. Instead of X applications, they now will need to process perhaps 1.8X applications. No additional personnel, no additional support vendor orgs and in fact, sunsetting existing vendors to censor costs. Add a nation wide injunction that stops USCIS from raising costs. Just want everyone to be cognizant of that and have realistic expectations.

on top of all this, they need to process the self sufficiency I-944 form as well ......

[Turbulent_Dragonfly]

Bigger question is, how many will USCIS actually process and how many will it waste? We know empirically that they struggle to process 140,000 a year and in any given year, there is some wastage. Add to this construct, required visa interviews, additional RFEs, intentions and add in a pandemic situation where capacity, efficiency are not exactly optimal and not to mention dwindling operating budgets and you can imagine where we might get with this. Just as the number of spill over green cards added are historic, there is perhaps going to be visa wastage at historic proportions as well. Everyone is looking at their dates and how much the bulletins move forward, just also remember nothing has changed with regards to processing capabilities. Instead of X applications, USCIS will now need to process perhaps 1.8X applications. No additional personnel, no additional supporting vendor orgs to help process this additional workload and in fact, USCIS is sunsetting existing vendor support partners to reduce costs. Add to that, a nation wide injunction issued by the courts that stops USCIS from raising costs. I dont want to sound like an apologist for USCIS, just want everyone to be cognizant of that and have realistic expectations.

Now if they do the right thing by hiring more personnel on account of getting all the money from moving the filing dates ahead, they will be able to ramp up the approvals. That combined with waiving interviews will help. At this time, a lot hinges on the elections and the decisions made immediately after that until January no matter who wins.

[Spectator]

So I guess it's safe to say
272,788 gc might be this EB 2021 limit?

No, because that's only the CP numbers.

To calculate the limit, you would need to know the AOS approvals as well.

Best to stick with CO's initial estimate for now.

[srimurthy]

Assume they will drag their feet as much as they can. What I really want to know is can USCIS keep all other countries "current" even after they reach their 7% limit for this year, basically siphoning the extra visas to other countries rather than India. I keep hearing "hidden demand" in philippines and South korea in EB3 category.. but ideally that demand should not matter because those countries should get capped off at 7% ( ~5K visas) for this year.

I am not sure but from the previous responses, I guess in previous years it was Philippines or South Korea that got more than 2800 (7% in EB3) because they did not use or reach the 7% in other categories like EB1, EB2 or FB. Not sure exactly they underutilized and overallocated beyond 2800 even through EB2/3 I and C and backlogged.

[vsivarama]

Now if they do the right thing by hiring more personnel on account of getting all the money from moving the filing dates ahead, they will be able to ramp up the approvals. That combined with waiving interviews will help. At this time, a lot hinges on the elections and the decisions made immediately after that until January no matter who wins.

Don't assume that USCIS can only apply a visa number once your case is approved. The USCIS can potentially apply a visa number to your case towards the end of FY 2021 and it will get approved when it does at a later time (FY 2022). Average AOS process time looks like between 12 - 24 months. So if they just waited to apply the numbers once cases got approved, they would be wasting numbers left right and center every year by just accepting filing dates for the next FY.

[racharox]

Hello gurus, Long time visitor of this forum, and would like to ask a question. I'm trying to understand the demand and supply equation here for EB2I/EB3I for this FY, and how the demand will individually play out for each category. For those who already upgraded their I140 from EB3 to EB2, and never filed 485, can those applicants choose to instead file under EB3? If yes - the FAD between these two categories won't be of a big difference, wouldn't it?

[vsivarama]

Greg Siskind's tweet about November bulletin - https://twitter.com/gsiskind/status/1318980930422427648

"Someone I trust has mentioned on a listserv that Charlie Oppenheim, the DOS official who writes the Visa Bulletin, told him that the November one won't be out, in all likelihood, before next Monday. So you can stop asking me when it's coming out." It looks like they want to wait as long as possible to see how many applications are filed before they release the bulletin. Maybe the fling dates won't be current next month if they are monitoring it so closely.

[idliman]

Greg Siskind's tweet about November bulletin - https://twitter.com/gsiskind/status/1318980930422427648

"Someone I trust has mentioned on a listserv that Charlie Oppenheim, the DOS official who writes the Visa Bulletin, told him that the November one won't be out, in all likelihood, before next Monday. So you can stop asking me when it's coming out." It looks like they want to wait as long as possible to see how many applications are filed before they release the bulletin. Maybe the fling dates won't be current next month if they are monitoring it so closely.

Great. This means people will not know whether the filing dates will be honored in November 2020 or not. USCIS usually takes a week after the VB to update its website. So anyone who is thinking of sending applications based on "DF", hurry-up and send the applications on or before 29OCT2020.

[ferric]

Bigger question is, how many will USCIS actually process and how many will it waste? We know empirically that they struggle to process 140,000 a year and in any given year, there is some wastage.

[..]

Instead of X applications, USCIS will now need to process perhaps 1.8X applications. No additional personnel, no additional supporting vendor orgs to help process this additional workload and in fact, USCIS is sunsetting existing vendor support partners to reduce costs.

They’re processing the same number of applications, though. Just less family more employment, not sure why any of this should make a difference, it’s not like FB VOs are different from EB VOs...

[YTeleven]

Greg Siskind's tweet about November bulletin - https://twitter.com/gsiskind/status/1318980930422427648

"Someone I trust has mentioned on a listserv that Charlie Oppenheim, the DOS official who writes the Visa Bulletin, told him that the November one won't be out, in all likelihood, before next Monday. So you can stop asking me when it's coming out." It looks like they want to wait as long as possible to see how many applications are filed before they release the bulletin. Maybe the fling dates won't be current next month if they are monitoring it so closely.

I don't see any logic behind retrogressing the dates so early. Only reason I could think of is the fee hike stay.

[rohanvus]

I don't see any logic behind retrogressing the dates so early. Only reason I could think of is the fee hike stay.

What does next Monday mean - is its 26th Oct or 2nd November ?

[Turbulent_Dragonfly]

What does next Monday mean - is its 26th Oct or 2nd November ?

Next Monday means the Monday that is coming next, which will be five days from today.

[Zenzone]

Great. This means people will not know whether the filing dates will be honored in November 2020 or not. USCIS usually takes a week after the VB to update its website. So anyone who is thinking of sending applications based on "DF", hurry-up and send the applications on or before 29OCT2020.

I think USCIS will continue to honor the DF charts in the Oct bulletin through Q1 21 fiscal. But that's not to say that you have to file to Idli's point above! Its always prudent to get it done as fast as you can!

[Spectator]

What I really want to know is can USCIS keep all other countries "current" even after they reach their 7% limit for this year, basically siphoning the extra visas to other countries rather than India. I keep hearing "hidden demand" in philippines and South korea in EB3 category.. but ideally that demand should not matter because those countries should get capped off at 7% ( ~5K visas) for this year.

I’m not sure what you mean by “all other countries "current" even after they reach their 7% limit for this year”

There isn’t a 7% limit for the category “All Chargeability Areas Except Those Listed” (sometimes called ROW).

ROW refers to over 200 individual Countries, each of which has their own 7% limit.

If one (or more) of those Countries reaches their 7% limit, then they will be shown separately in the VB with their own Cut Off Dates.

ROW will retrogress in a category when the overall demand is more than overall visas available for that category in the FY.

If overall demand for ROW is less than the number of visas available to them, then horizontal spillover will occur.

As someone else has mentioned, the 7% allocation does not necessarily mean exact prorated numbers in each category.

The 7% figure is calculated based on the total EB & FB allocations
e.g. (271,500 + 226,000) * 7% = 34,825.

Lower use elsewhere can allow more use in a category, so long as total use across all categories (both EB & FB) does not exceed the total 7% figure.

You can't make the blanket statement of "those countries should get capped off at 7% ( ~5K visas) for this year" because it doesn't quite work like that.

Only a handful of Countries even approach 7% overall use.

[inspired_p]

I’m not sure what you mean by “all other countries "current" even after they reach their 7% limit for this year”

There isn’t a 7% limit for the category “All Chargeability Areas Except Those Listed” (sometimes called ROW).

ROW refers to over 200 individual Countries, each of which has their own 7% limit.

If one (or more) of those Countries reaches their 7% limit, then they will be shown separately in the VB with their own Cut Off Dates.

ROW will retrogress in a category when the overall demand is more than overall visas available for that category in the FY.

If overall demand for ROW is less than the number of visas available to them, then horizontal spillover will occur.

As someone else has mentioned, the 7% allocation does not necessarily mean exact prorated numbers in each category.

The 7% figure is calculated based on the total EB & FB allocations
e.g. (271,500 + 226,000) * 7% = 34,825.

Lower use elsewhere can allow more use in a category, so long as total use across all categories (both EB & FB) does not exceed the total 7% figure.

You can't make the blanket statement of "those countries should get capped off at 7% ( ~5K visas) for this year" because it doesn't quite work like that.

Only a handful of Countries even approach 7% overall use.

Thank you Spec. This explains a lot. I did not know 7% is for overall visas and not calculated per country per category. This would mean that Philippines South Korea high demand in EB3 may use up available visas if they don’t have any other visa allocation in other categories
Thank you for clarifying this.

[rabp77]

Thank you Spec. This explains a lot. I did not know 7% is for overall visas and not calculated per country per category. This would mean that Philippines South Korea high demand in EB3 may use up available visas if they don’t have any other visa allocation in other categories
Thank you for clarifying this.

yeah...of late it looks like per country cap is being applied across the EB + FB. But as i recollect, a few years ago, the per country cap used to be applied separately to the EB and FB.