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News : USCIS Completes H1B 2018 Lottery – 199K Petitions Received

Finally, all the speculations and rumors regarding H1B Petitions come to end…USCIS sticks with H1B Lottery for FY 2018 as in Regulation . They have released a press note indicating that H1B Visa Lottery Process was completed for FY 2018 quota on April 11th. Below are the Details.

Summary of the USCIS News – H1B Lottery  199k Petitions :

  • April 7th – Cap Reached : USCIS reconfirmed their announcement that they reached H1B cap on April 7th for FY 2018 quota, including the info that they received more petitions for regular and masters cap.
  • Total H1B Petitions : USCIS said that they have received total of 199,000 H1B petitions for FY 2018 quota.
  • H1B 2018 Lottery Date : USCIS Conducted H1B Lottery on April 11th, 2017. Many were not believing the checks cashed and info reported by others considering as fake…but the reality is that lottery was completed on April 11th and that’s why some attorneys were confirming that their petitions checks were cashed.
  • Masters Cap Petitions FY 2018 : USCIS also confirmed that they have received more than 20,000 petitions for Masters quota and they have conducted lottery first for Masters or Advanced degree cap applications and then the unselected petitions were pooled into the regular quota pool and remaining 65,000 petitions were selected. This is standard Lottery process, no changes. Check How does H1B Lottery Work, Process
  • Unselected H1B Lottery Petitions : USCIS will reject and return all the H1B petitions that were not selected in H1B 2018 lottery process along with the filing fee, unless they find that petition to be duplicate filing. Check out one of the Real H1B Rejection Letters from previous year.
  • Premium Processing Suspension : As announced earlier by USCIS they have suspended H1B Premium processing for FY 2018 up to 6 months and no changes here.
  • Cap Exempt H1B Petitions Acceptance : USCIS said that they will continue to accept cap exempt petitions that are typically field for H1B Extensions, Change in terms of employment for H1B workers, Change of employers on H1B and H1B workers, who plan to work concurrently on second petition.

Our H1B 2018 Predictions vs Actuals USCIS Numbers.

As per our H1B Visa 2018 Lottery Predictions, we anticipated anywhere between 210,000 to 240,000 thousand petitions for H1B Visa 2018 Quota . The actual USCIS lottery numbers of 199,000 H1B petitions is almost in-line with around 5% difference from our predictions. There were many who did not agree with this number considering New Trump Administration, Speculation on Visa policies changes, Indian MNCs not filing, etc. …but, the reality as we wrote in our article is different when you look at holistic situation.  Hope our lottery predictions helped at least few in one way or other.

What’s Summary – Long Wait ahead  ?

All the speculations of NOT having lottery come to an end…It is unfortunate to see many top notch talent and hardworking students, professionals across the globe, including the likes of Ivy League, IIT graduates, putting their fate in H1B Lottery for their dream to work in US…But, that’s the reality…Lets hope one of good H1B Visa Bills will fix this for next year …Anyways, last year too there were some checks cashed earlier for premium processing cases as attorneys informed the same. This year too same thing happened… The overall press release is in-line with last year, no big surprises. The biggest difference this year is that there is no premium processing and everyone are in same boat…The wait is going to be long  friends…be prepared ! The only way to keep one another informed is by adding your case details anonymous at our H1B Tracker.  Please add it as it is crowdsourced and will help others and You ! If you have got a H1B receipt number, you may wonder what is that number. Read Understand H1B EAC Number
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What do you all think of the H1B Lottery for FY 2018 ? Add your thoughts ?  Let’s keep the discussion friendly…

Reference : USCIS Official Press Release – H1B 2018 Lottery Completed

   

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