The winter holidays, together with the summer vacation season, create a steady flow of inquiries and consultations from our clients regarding travel and passport expiration dates. Most often the question is, What should be the duration of the passport for purposes of entering the U.S.? At Least Six Months Passport Validity Required As an initial [...]
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) announced recently that ICE would be issuing Notices of Inspection (NOI) to 1,000 employers across the United States associated with critical infrastructure. The NOIS will seek to determine the employers’ compliance with employment eligibility verification laws. What is Critical Infrastructure Employer? The announcement seems to focus on employers associated with [...]
USCIS has released a schedule of the inventory of pending Form I-485, Application to Adjust Status. The statistics are fairly recent - as of August 25, 2009 - and are very helpful to understanding the relative queue positions for adjustment of status applicants. How Can I Determine My Place in the AOS Queue? An AOS application’s preference [...]
The increasing unemployment rate inevitably affects foreign nationals living and working in the U.S. on a work visa. We have been happy to help many clients over the past months who have either been laid off or have decided to seek a better opportunity to attend school by changing their status to F, J or [...]
As an E-Verify designated agent, we provide E-Verify verification services to many small and mid-size businesses and allow them to assure E-Verify participation without the hassle of running E-Verify inside their operations. An E-Verify designated agent, we work with our E-Verify company clients to ensure that they follow the rules and procesures required by E-Verify. This [...]
It is often that minor children are included in immigration filings done by one or both of their parents. In such cases, a separate application, often accompanied by a G-28 form, are prepared and properly filed. In many of those instances, a question arises as to who can or must sign the paperwork on behalf [...]
The Nebraska and Texas Service Centers (NSC and TSC, respectively) have informed that they will start issuing denials on pending I-485 upon denial of the underlying I-140 petition. Until now, USCIS has a policy from a Memorandum of Feb. 28, 2003 from William R. Yates, “Procedures for Concurrently Filed Family-Based or Employment-Based Form I-485 when the [...]
As part of our regular USCIS-related filings, we receive requests for evidence (”RFES”) on a number of occasions. Such RFES are standard practice and often are unrelated to the substance of the petition - for example, requesting clear copies of the lastest Form I-94 card. It is our practice to ensure that each petition filed [...]
After USCIS suspended temporarily the I-140 premium processing service on July 2, 2007, we have been constantly fielding questions on when the temporary suspension would end. Over the past few weeks there was increased speculation that premium processing for Form I-140 would resume. Earlier this week, USCIS confirmed that in fact premium processing for I-140 [...]