On April 1, 2024, pursuant a final DHS rule, the immigration agency USCIS changed its premium processing time for certain immigration petitions from 15 calendar days to 15 business days.
This is the same rule that increased substantially many government fees for immigration benefits, so the change to premium processing went unnoticed by many. However, while the change to business days may not seem like a big difference, every day that goes by without an adjudication on immigration petitions can matter greatly to both employers and employees.
As a recap, premium processing provides faster processing of certain types of temporary and immigrant worker petitions, including H-1B, TN, O-1, and I-140 petitions by USCIS. The premium processing time for most petitions used to be 15 calendar days. As of April 1, 2024, however, that changed to 15 business days for most petitions which remains in effect.
Some types of immigration petitions are subject to longer premium processing time periods, of 30 and 45 days. Regardless of the premium processing time period though (15-, 30-, or 45-day), all are now business days (instead of calendar days), which is important to keep in mind when planning and preparing petitions or waiting for petition adjudications by the agency. More information about which petitions qualify for premium processing is on USCIS’s website.
A summary of temporary worker (I-129) petitions with 15 business days processing is below:
- E-1/E-2 treaty trader/treaty investor petitions
- E-3 certain specialty occupation professionals from Australia
- H-1B specialty occupation workers
- H-2B temporary workers performing nonagricultural services
- H-3 trainee or special education exchange visitor
- L-1 intracompany transferee, executive/manager or specialized knowledge capacity
- Blanket L-1 (LZ)
- O-1/O-2 individuals with extraordinary ability and essential support personnel
- P-1/P-2/P-3: internationally recognized athletes, artists or entertainers, and artist or entertainer in a culturally unique program, and essential support personnel to these categories of P-1S/P-2S/P-3S
- Q-1 international cultural exchange
- R-1 in a religious occupation
- TN professional under the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement USMCA
A summary of immigrant petitions for workers (I-140) with 15 business days processing is below:
- EB-1A extraordinary ability classification
- EB-1B outstanding professors and researchers classification
- EB-2 advanced degrees or exceptional ability not seeking a National Interest Waiver
- EB-3 classification for skilled workers, professionals, and other workers
As a reminder, premium processing does not mean automatic approval of the request within the relevant time period. Rather, USCIS may potentially take any one of the following adjudicative actions: approval, request for evidence, notice of intent to deny, denial, or open an investigation. More information can be found on USCIS’s website and in its final rule.
