USCIS posted updates on the H-1B registration process to its registration portal between March 25, 2023, and today, March 27, 2023. As expected, USCIS has received more electronic H-1B cap registrations than available H-1B numbers under the quota of 85,000 new H-1B filings, necessitating a lottery. It appears that USCIS has completed notification for all selected registrations.
Employers and attorneys will need to log in to the USCIS registration portal in order to learn the status of each registration. Registrations will have one of the below statuses:
- Selected: "Selected" means that the registration was
selected in the lottery. For selected registrations, employers will
have 90 days to submit a complete H-1B petition to USCIS for
adjudication. The H-1B petition filing window begins on April 1,
2023 and ends on June 30, 2023.
- Submitted: Properly submitted registrations, which have not
been selected in the lottery, will be held "in reserve"
in the event that USCIS does not receive an H-1B petition for each
selected registration. There is a possibility that USCIS will hold
a subsequent lottery later in the year and select some of those
registrations that are being held in reserve. These registrations
will continue to show a status of "submitted," likely
until after the end of the petition filing window, when USCIS will
determine if a petition was filed for each of the selected
registrations. In two of the past three years, USCIS has conducted
a second H-1B lottery in late July.
- Denied / Invalidated-Failed Payment: A registration will be denied if an employer submitted duplicate registrations for the beneficiary or if payment was declined and not reconciled.
The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.