On April 8, 2013, USCIS announced that it received about 124,000 H-1B petitions for the fiscal year 2014 reaching both the 65,000 statutory cap and reaching the special, additional 20,000 H-1B petition quota for foreign nationals with U.S. earned advanced degrees. It also announced that on April 7, 2013, it had conducted a random selection process to choose petitions to meet the 65,000 cap and the additional 20,000 advanced degree limit.
As it announced on March 15, 2013, USCIS will resume premium processing on April 15, 2013, which it temporarily suspended in advance of the predicted H-1B filing deluge which it just received. USCIS will also begin returning rejected filings, together with the attached filing fees.
