INFORMATION CONCERNING FY 2022 H-1B LOTTERY

On February 05, 2021 USCIS announced that the initial registration period for the fiscal year (FY) 2022 H-1B cap will open at noon Eastern on March 9, 2021 and run through noon Eastern on March 25, 2021. During this period, prospective petitioners and representatives will be able to fill out petitioner and beneficiary information and submit their registrations. A confirmation number will be assigned to each registration submitted for the FY 2022 H-1B cap. This number is used solely to track registrations; you cannot use this number to track your case status in Case Status Online.

Prospective H-1B cap-subject petitioners or their representatives are required to use a myUSCIS online account to register each beneficiary electronically for the selection process and pay the associated $10 H-1B registration fee for each registration submitted on behalf of each beneficiary. Prospective petitioners submitting their own registrations (U.S. employers and U.S. agents, collectively known as “registrants”) will use a “registrant” account that will be available soon. Representatives may add clients to their accounts at any time, but both representatives and registrants must wait until March 9 to enter beneficiary information and submit the $10 fee. Prospective petitioners or their representatives will be able to submit registrations for multiple beneficiaries in a single online session. Through the account, they will be able to prepare, edit, and store draft registrations prior to final payment and submission of each registration.

Following information will be required to complete the online registration process, such as, “Employer’s Name; Name and Title of contact person of the sponsoring employer; Mailing Address, Telephone Number, and E-mail address of contact person of the sponsoring employer; FEIN number of the employer; Signature of the contact person; Name of Employee/Foreign National; DOB, Country of Birth, Country of Citizenship, Gender, Passport Number of the Employee/Foreign National; Filing Category (Regular or Masters Cap).

If USCIS receives enough registrations by March 25, 2021, USCIS will randomly select registrations and send selection notifications via users’ myUSCIS online accounts. USCIS intends to notify account holders by March 31, 2021. The employers can start submitting the complete H-1B Petition for the Petition’s picked up in the lottery as early as April 01, 2020 and up to 90 days after a H-1B Petition has been picked up in the lottery.

An H-1B cap-subject petition must be filed within the period indicated on the relevant registration selection notice. The period for filing the H-1B cap-subject petition will be at least 90 days. Please note, petitioners must include a printed copy of the applicable registration selection notice with the FY 2021 H-1B cap-subject petition and the start date on the I-129 Petition should be October 01, 2021. Petitioners filing H-1B cap-subject petitions, including those petitions eligible for the advanced degree exemption, must still establish eligibility for petition approval at the time the petition is filed and through adjudication, based on existing statutory and regulatory requirements. Selection in the registration process does not relieve the petitioner from submitting evidence or otherwise establishing eligibility, as registration only pertains to eligibility to file the H-1B cap-subject petition. An H-1B cap-subject petition may only be filed by a petitioner whose registration for that beneficiary was selected in the H-1B registration process.

Registrants’ online accounts will show one of the following statuses for each registration (that is, for each beneficiary registered):

1. Submitted: A registration status may continue to show “Submitted” after the initial selection process has been completed. “Submitted” registrations will remain in consideration for selection until the end of the fiscal year, at which point all registration statuses will be Selected, Not Selected, or Denied.
2. Selected: Selected to file an FY 2022 H-1B cap-subject petition.
3. Denied: A duplicate registration was submitted by the same registrant for the same beneficiary, or a payment method was declined and not reconciled. If denied as a duplicate registration, all registrations you submitted for this beneficiary for the fiscal year are invalid.

In addition, USCIS has also announced on February 04, 2021 that DHS is delaying the effective date of the H-1B Selection Process final rule until Dec. 31, 2021. USCIS will apply the regulations currently in place (random selection) to the initial registration period, and any subsequent registration period for the FY 2022 registration process that takes place before Dec. 31, 2021.

Please refer to our previous articles on H1B CAP. We will regularly update the blog as soon as any new information is available.

Disclaimer

This article aims to provide new information concerning FY 2022 H-1B Lottery. This article, under no circumstances, acts as legal advice; therefore, for any immigration questions, please contact your Attorney or the Ahluwalia Law Offices, P.C. (Team ALO).