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Amid the coronavirus pandemic, United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has been experiencing severe delays in scheduling or rescheduling Immigration Application Support Center (ASC) appointments to collect biometrics. Several factors are currently contributing to delays in processing times including demand and staff availability.
Between March and June 2020, USCIS temporarily suspended its in-person services to help ease the spread of COVID-19, while ensuring employee and customer safety. During this period, approximately 280,000 appointments were cancelled. In July, USCIS began a phased reopening of its ASCs, with 132 sites reopened after COVID safe protocols were introduced.
However, since the reopening of many ASCs, several have had to close again sporadically because of COVID or extreme weather. Between July and September 2020, ASCs were reportedly operating at below 50% of pre-COVID levels. By later October, this had risen to 65%.
ASC operations
Currently, USCIS is working to safely maximize appointment capacity at ASCs and is reusing previously collected biometric data to carry out background and security checks when authorized by law. Based on unique capacity limitations at each ASC, all cancelled US immigration appointments have not yet been rescheduled.
According to USCIS, the agency is currently rescheduling around 10,400 appointments per day. Approximately 1.3 million US visa and immigration applications are awaiting biometric appointments as of mid-December.
Immigration applicants are being urged to wait for an ASC appointment notice or a Form I-797, Notice of Action, from USCIS indicating that previously used biometric data may be used to process their application.
Appointment prioritization
Biometric appointments are currently being scheduled based on the prioritization of benefit types, considering adjudication capacity and processing times. Within benefit types, USCIS tends to schedule appointments on a first-in, first-out basis.
USCIS states that appointment waiting times will vary from region to region based on capacity and demand at each ASC location.
Reuse of biometrics
Amid the coronavirus pandemic, USCIS is authorized to reuse biometrics under limited circumstances, and usually where it must verify an individual’s identity or where a case is ready to adjudicate. Should USCIS reuse an applicant’s biometric data, a Form I-797 notice will be issued to the applicant.
This means that an applicant will not be required to attend an in-person appointment at an ASC.
Walk-in biometric data collection
Current COVID-19 restrictions prohibit ASCs from processing walk-ins for biometric data collection. Exemptions to this rule apply for military applicants and their family members where the primary applicant is scheduled for an appointment.
Prior to visiting any USCIS facility, applicants are being urged to check the agency’s website for office closures or visit the ASC webpage for more information.
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