Possible answers to what's causing ROC processing delays

[Wingnutfish 18]

Hi again,

 

Obviously, with the adjudication for removal of conditions (ROC) processing taking over a year - and at least until recently seeming to get longer and longer - most of us have been wondering what's going on. Well, I asked an immigration officer about it at our InfoPass appointment last week.

 

Though she reminded me that "a one-year wait is considered normal", she said she thinks the processing has been slowed down by (1) an increase in green card renewal/application activity after the current president was elected (perhaps from people fearing, rightly or not, that things could get more difficult in the future) compounded by (2) the federal government hiring freeze that came into place around the same time, making it difficult for them to increase their staff to handle the bigger workload.

 

She mentioned that the hiring freeze was now over, but that it takes time to fill the jobs. Seems like that could be a good sign that the processing times might gradually speed up from now though.

 

Good luck everyone! :-)

[mycase17 114]

28 minutes ago, Wingnutfish said:

Hi again,

 

Obviously, with the adjudication for removal of conditions (ROC) processing taking over a year - and at least until recently seeming to get longer and longer - most of us have been wondering what's going on. Well, I asked an immigration officer about it at our InfoPass appointment last week.

 

Though she reminded me that "a one-year wait is considered normal", she said she thinks the processing has been slowed down by (1) an increase in green card renewal/application activity after the current president was elected (perhaps from people fearing, rightly or not, that things could get more difficult in the future) compounded by (2) the federal government hiring freeze that came into place around the same time, making it difficult for them to increase their staff to handle the bigger workload.

 

She mentioned that the hiring freeze was now over, but that it takes time to fill the jobs. Seems like that could be a good sign that the processing times might gradually speed up from now though.

 

Good luck everyone! :-)

where was your info pass appointment? And when IO said hiring freeze was over, did he mean CSC hiring freeze?

I really hope they pick up at some point because on this pattern,I'm losing hope being NOV 16 filer. 

[mcdull 474]

makes zero sense. people need to apply to remove condition regardless of the president.

 

It is not like under Obama, Conditional Permanent Resident didn't have to send in i751.

 

Where did they hire your ISO? the DMV?

[WinnfieldJules 17]

1 hour ago, Wingnutfish said:

(1) an increase in green card renewal/application activity after the current president was elected (perhaps from people fearing, rightly or not, that things could get more difficult in the future) compounded by (2) the federal government hiring freeze that came into place around the same time, making it difficult for them to increase their staff to handle the bigger workload.

Same old "hiring freeze" and "backlog" bull...that was enough to justify the delay 6 months ago. Now, with people waiting over 13-14 months and more, I believe they should just make a more appropriate excuse, at least it wouldnt be as disrespectful. 

[hsa12390 30]

Just my 2 cents: when I applied back in July 2016 (before elections obviously) at that point VSC was taking over a year, they seem to have sped up. So while CSC applicants have been waiting longer, us VSC filers are getting approved much faster, so i don't think the Pres nor a hiring freeze would explain that. 

[charmander 692]

It is all about priorities. There were times (circa 2012-2013) both service centers were doing an excellent job with ROCs in less than 2-3 months adjudications. People who became CPR around 2010-2011 were the lucky ones to experience super expedited ROC processing. First VSC de-prioritized ROCs, CSC bailed them out a few times with workload transfers but since August 2015 no ROC workload transfer has happened. March 2015 VSC filers were the last ones that experienced ~7-8 months adjudications, since then VSC was always below 10-12 months range. CSC kept up its good work for a long while up until last few months. whatever happened they also de-prioritized ROCs. Now both service centers are in a bad situation. It used to be just the VSC filers, but now CSC people are becoming eligible to file for naturalization with pending ROCs. Maybe that's what service centers want to dump the cases to field offices, who knows.

 

USCIS opened Potamac Service center to help with workload but Potamac does not process I-751s, hence no service center left to bail these guys out. One way or the other they will have to deal with it on their own at this point. If someone asks me I'd put money on CSC to recover first, historically they were always good with ROCs. Within short amount of time they were able process few months of workload before, it wouldn't surprise me one bit if CSC goes back to below 6 months again soon. VSC on the other hand was always in bad shape. It would really take long while and couple workload transfers to bring VSC back in below-6 months range.

 

 

[Calikitkat 16]

4 hours ago, charmander said:

It is all about priorities. There were times (circa 2012-2013) both service centers were doing an excellent job with ROCs in less than 2-3 months adjudications. People who became CPR around 2010-2011 were the lucky ones to experience super expedited ROC processing. First VSC de-prioritized ROCs, CSC bailed them out a few times with workload transfers but since August 2015 no ROC workload transfer has happened. March 2015 VSC filers were the last ones that experienced ~7-8 months adjudications, since then VSC was always below 10-12 months range. CSC kept up its good work for a long while up until last few months. whatever happened they also de-prioritized ROCs. Now both service centers are in a bad situation. It used to be just the VSC filers, but now CSC people are becoming eligible to file for naturalization with pending ROCs. Maybe that's what service centers want to dump the cases to field offices, who knows.

 

USCIS opened Potamac Service center to help with workload but Potamac does not process I-751s, hence no service center left to bail these guys out. One way or the other they will have to deal with it on their own at this point. If someone asks me I'd put money on CSC to recover first, historically they were always good with ROCs. Within short amount of time they were able process few months of workload before, it wouldn't surprise me one bit if CSC goes back to below 6 months again soon. VSC on the other hand was always in bad shape. It would really take long while and couple workload transfers to bring VSC back in below-6 months range.

 

 

I hope you are right and CSC picks up ASAP...