What is the LCA certifing process and when to file H1B extension petition

Dear all,

Here is my situation,

My H1B petition is getting expired on July 30 2013.

LCA took 10 days to be removed from DOL’s notice board.

My current project ends on May31. I might not have a project for a while after that.

My questions:

  1. My case was removed from DoL’s notice borad on Apr29, does that mean my LCA is already certified? (BTW HR said that all my LCA related process is already done)

  2. If LCA is certified, what HR will do before filing the petition to USCIS? why do they take already 4 days and not filed yet? is there a SLA for this? or it is just a delay in HR process?

  3. Normally how long it takes to get a receipt number from USCIS after filling the H1B Petition for extension?

  4. My manager suggested me that I can return to my home country after getting the reciept number but without an approved petition. Is this doable? is there any risk to get the petition approved?

Thanks for your reply!

Shine

  1. You can use http://icert.doleta.gov/ to check the status of your LCA.

  2. Employer will have to sign the LCA and send it across to the attorney. (It happened in my case). Attorney will send the petition to USCIS along with copy of LCA.

  3. Anywhere between 2-6 months. Premium will be faster.

  4. Not sure. I don’t think so. But why do you want to go to home country (- if there is no personal reason)? You can stay here till your extn decision comes from USCIS.

I don’t have project after May 31 in US, I can’t stay here without billing this is what my manager says.

Alright, then you can go back. Shouldn’t affect your extension process, but you will need to get it stamped whenever you want to come back to US.