November 20, 2009
CIS has announced that as of November 13, 2009, approximately 55,600 Fiscal Year 2010 regular H-1B cap petitions and approximately 20,000 U.S. Master's/advanced degree cap petitions have been received. The prior count of October 25 showed that 52,800 cap cases had been received, indicating an increase of approximately 2,800 in less than a month.
Please note that going forward all U.S. Master’s/advanced degree H-1B petitions received by the Immigration Service will now count toward the general H-1B cap of 58,200 per fiscal year (i.e, a total of 65,000 H-1B slots per fiscal year, minus those H-1B slots set aside for Free Trade Visas for Chileans and Singaporeans). This leaves approximately 2,600 H-1B numbers left for this fiscal year. Assuming usage rates continue unchanged, the H-1B quota could be exhausted by the end of this calendar year or early next year. However, employers still planning to file H-1B cap cases are urged to do so as soon as possible as the cap could be reached sooner than anticipated. CIS has indicated that on the day it determines that sufficient regular H cap petitions have been received to meet the Fiscal Year 2010 quota, it will conduct a computerized random selection lottery from among the petitions received on that day.
All H-1B cap cases filed through November 13, 2009 have been accepted and counted against the H-1B quota. This does not mean that the filings have been approved, but just that they have not been subject to an H cap lottery.
