USCIS has announced that the H-1B visa cap of 65,000 visas, and the 20,000 for U.S. advanced (Ph.D., Master’s) degrees, has not been reached. This means that all applications properly submitted through April 7th will be accepted and adjudicated (and there will be no lottery for these applications). Further, there is time remaining in which to submit new applications.
USCIS says almost all the 20,000 advanced degree visa numbers have been used, but only about half of the 65,000 used.
Initially, rumor was that the cap would be reached on April 7th but this has turned out not to be so. Last year 163,000 applications were received in the first five business days of April.
As a reminder, regardless of when decided new H-1B’s will not be valid until October 1, 2009 at the earliest.
As we have more information we will let you know.
Martin
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