On September 28, 2012, the Department of Labor (DOL) issued a notice in the Federal Register announcing the initiation of electronic filing for the H-2A and H-2B nonimmigrant visa programs. Electronic filing will be accomplished using the DOL's iCert electronic filing website and will begin:

For more information on the H-2B program, see DOL: H-2B Certification for Temporary Non-Agricultural Work. For more information on the H-2A program, see DOL: H-2A Temporary Agricultural Program.

On September 28, 2012, USCIS published its September 2012 E-Verify newsletter, in which the agency, among other actions:

For more information on E-Verify, see Practice Note, E-Verify for Employers: Best Practices.

On September 21, 2012, the State Department announced instructions for the 2014 Diversity Visa lottery program. Under this program, foreign nationals may submit an online application between October 2 and November 3, 2012 for a chance to obtain a green card in fiscal year 2014, which runs from October 1, 2013, to September 30, 2014. Successful lottery applicants must be able to show that they:

Foreign nationals should review the State Department's instructions to determine if they qualify for the diversity lottery program and for step-by-step procedures to follow for their qualifying application.

On September 19, 2012, the Board of Alien Labor Certification Appeals (BALCA) issued a decision in In re Select International, Inc., reminding employers that they must investigate whether applicants responding to PERM advertisements qualify for the offered job, or may become qualified within a reasonable period of time (2011-PER-01478 (Sept. 19, 2012)). BALCA affirmed that applicants who are clearly not qualified for the offered job based on their resumes may be rejected without an interview or further review. However, applicants whose education, training or experience is not as clear should be interviewed or investigated further to determine their qualifications for the offered job.

For more information, see Practice Note, The PERM Labor Certification Process: PERM Recruitment Résumé Assessment and Reporting.

The US Department of State's Bureau of Consular Affairs released the October 2012 Visa Bulletin on September 10, 2012. The new bulletin reflects continuing backlogs in most employment-based immigrant visa categories. For example, all workers sponsored in the employment-based second (EB2) and third (EB3) preference categories are subject to backlogs. That means that the sponsored worker cannot pursue the final issuance of her lawful permanent resident (LPR) status until the visa bulletin shows that green cards are available for the worker's country of birth and sponsorship category, and the worker must continue to maintain separate lawful status to continue to live and work in the US.

The bulletin also shows that as of October 1st two categories are unavailable to workers:

The laws authorizing these programs were set to expire on September 30, 2012, and green cards could not be issued under them as of October 1st unless each program was reauthorized by Congress. On September 28, 2012, the President signed reauthorized these programs, among others (see Legal Update, President Obama Signs Reauthorization of E-Verify and Other Immigration Programs).

For more information on the visa bulletin and calculating immigrant visa backlogs, see Key Immigrant Visa Classifications Chart: Box, Immigrant Visa Backlogs.

On September 5, 2012, the US Embassy in New Delhi announced a new visa processing system. The new system, effective September 26, 2012, streamlines the process for foreign nationals in India to schedule and apply for visas at a US embassy or consulate. Under the new system, visa applicants:

Once launched, visa applicants may access the visa processing website for more information.

For more information on US visa applications, see Practice Note, Applying for a Nonimmigrant Visa to the US and US Nonimmigrant Visa Application Best Practices Checklist.