The Department of State (DOS) Visa Bulletin for October 2008 announced significant changes in priority dates for several employment-based visa categories.

After being "unavailable" since June, employment-based third preference (EB3) numbers are now available. For all countries other than India, China and Mexico, the EB3 priority date will be January 1, 2005. EB3 China will move to October 1, 2001, EB3 India will move to July 1, 2001, and EB3 Mexico will move to July 1, 2002. These dates are significantly different than the EB3 priority dates that applied in June 2008.

In the employment-based second preference category (EB2), all countries other than India and China remain current. In September, both India and China EB2 had a priority date of August 1, 2006. In October, India EB2 will move back to April 1, 2003; China EB2 will move back to April 1, 2004. Employment-based first preference (EB1) remains current for all countries.

The EB3 priority dates may come as a surprise to some applicants, as the Department of State (DOS) had advised in the July 2008 Visa Bulletin,

Employment Third preference availability will return to the cut-off dates established for June in October, the first month of the new fiscal year." DOS explains in the October Visa Bulletin that due to high usage of immigrant visa numbers by USCIS, it was necessary establish "October Employment cut-off dates which are earlier than those which applied during FY 2008. Little if any forward movement of the cut-off dates in most Employment categories is likely until the extent of the CIS backlog of old priority dates can be determined.

It is important to note that "nationality" is not the same as citizenship. Generally, DOS looks at the country of birth in determining whether a person is a national of a given country. As a result, persons who become citizens of other countries (i.e., Indians who become Canadian citizens) are still considered nationals of their birth country for immigrant visa purposes.

For general information on visa retrogression, please see our FAQ on this subject. For more information on the Visa Bulletin and country quota movements, including information about movement in the Family-Based Quotas, please see our DOS Visa Bulletin and Quota Movement page which includes detailed nationality-specific charts of quota movement for the past decade.

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