Premium Processing Fee Increase

Effective next Monday, October 19, 2020, USCIS will increase the fees for premium processing. Currently, the fee for Form I-907, Request for Premium Processing, is $1,440 for all filings. Starting on Monday, this fee will be raised to $2,500 for all filings except those from petitioners filing Form I-129, Petition for a Nonimmigrant Worker requesting H-2B or R-1 nonimmigrant status. The fee for these petitions will be raised to $1,500. Any Form I-907 postmarked on or after October 19 must include the revised fee amount. If USCIS receives a form postmarked on or after October 19 with the old fee amount, USCIS will reject the request for premium processing and return the filing fee. It is important to note that if sending the petition via a courier service like UPS, FedEx, or DHL, the postmark date is the date on the courier receipt.

The fee increase is mandated by the Continuing Appropriations Act, 2021 and Other Extensions Act, Pub. L. No. 116-159 which was signed into law on October 1. This Act includes the Emergency Stopgap USCIS Stabilization Act, which expands Department of Homeland Security (DHS) authority with respect to premium processing services. Among other things, it requires USCIS to establish and collect additional fees for premium processing. USCIS will use these fees for providing premium processing, making infrastructure improvements, and offsetting the cost of providing adjudication and naturalization services.

The USCIS premium processing service allows petitioners to pay an additional fee to expedite the adjudication of Form I-129, Petition for a Nonimmigrant Worker and Form I-140, Immigrant Petition for Alien Worker. With premium processing, adjudication generally occurs within 15 days of USCIS's receipt of the petition.

For More Information:

View the news release from USCIS here.

This blog post does not serve as legal advice and does not establish any client-attorney privilege. Do not take any action based on the information contained in this post without consulting a qualified immigration attorney. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact our legal team directly.

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This information comes from a news release from the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA Doc. No. 20101604).