My partner previously reported that H-1B numbers were likely to be used up between Christmas and New Year’s, and based on what I heard this week at a conference in New York, the cap is likely to be reached no later than that.  It may, in fact, be reached sooner than Christmas, perhaps even in the next week.

I was speaking at a Continuing Legal Education course in New York sponsored by the American Immigration Lawyers Association, and USCIS officials on another panel informed the audience that the pace of H-1B filings had increased significantly in the past two weeks – about 2000 petitions were received in the short week before Thanksgiving alone.  While they did not reveal their “target” number of petitions to reach the H-1B cap, they only have, at most, 5000-6000 potential numbers available left, which means the cap will be hit very soon if that pace of filings does not decrease.