Federal Agencies, Practice Resources

VSC Explains Jump Forward in I-129 Processing Date

10/1/02 AILA Doc. No. 02100131.

VSC Explains Jump Forward in I-129 Processing Date

A number of AILA members have commented on the nearly 4-month movement forward in the processing dates reported by the Vermont Service Center in the report for the period ended September 15, 2002 vs. the report for the period ended August 5, 2002. 

AILA’s VSC Liaison Chair, Chris Stowe, inquired about this with the VSC. Following is the response from Keith Canney of the VSC:

“As indicated at the top of [the processing time] report, these dates apply to cases that are currently ‘staged’ for officers to work.

As you know, we are currently involved in SWIP, our annual file audit. Thus, we needed to stage enough work for all our officers to make it through SWIP week since we could not move files during the audit. Due to the I-129 processing times, we have chosen to stage this case type to those who are trained on I-129's. So the dates are accurate because these files are now in front of an officer. 

Due to staging so many case for quite a few officers, it may takes (sic.) us a while to work all staged I-129's to completion, but this is the reason for processing dates jumping ahead as much as they have.”

In a follow-up conversation, Mr. Canney indicated that the anticipated adjudication time is one month. This includes all the cases included in the processing dates from the last report through the current processing dates posted.

If any pending cases within the time spread are not adjudicated in the next 30 days, members should call the information line at the VSC for an update.