"Lost" Immigrant Visa Numbers
Posted Nov 20, 1999

We have reported in previous editions of The Law Office of Sheela Murthy, P.C. Bulletin that the delays in adjustment of status (I-485) processing at INS have resulted in certain benefits and burdens for companies and individuals who are processing permanent residency applications. An example of a benefit is the Department of State's decision to bring most employment-based categories "current", which has been particularly beneficial for nationals of China and India. The disadvantage of the INS delays has been a decline last year in the number of persons who became permanent residents of the U.S. as was reported in our Sept 1999 Bulletin of The Law Office of Sheela Murthy.

For the fiscal year 1999-2000, the U.S. Department of State estimates that 100,000 visa numbers will remain unused in the employment based visa categories, again because of I-485 backlogs. Since there is a new allocation for each fiscal year, those visa numbers will be lost permanently.

At some point, INS is likely to begin adjudicating I-485s at a faster rate, and those cases will draw from the numbers available at the time of approval. In effect, the cases which should have been approved in past years will instead draw from the numbers available in future years. It appears that the almost inevitable result of INS delays will be major retrogressions on the priority date chart at some point in the future.