Business Immigration Insights

Starting in May 2019, US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) will issue I-94 numbers with letters in addition to numbers. The new format will include nine numbers, followed by one letter and one number. Current I-94 numbers also have eleven characters, but only numbers. Examples of new I-94 numbers include: 111111111A1; 000000001B2; 123456789C3. I-94s in the current number-only format will remain valid through the listed “Admit Until Date”.

As a reminder, an I-94 record not only documents a foreign national’s current nonimmigrant status, but also governs the amount of time ...

The Department of Homeland Security has announced it will negotiate with 11 airports, located in Bogotá, Buenos Aires, Mexico City, Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, Edinburgh, Milan, Rome, Keflavik, Osaka, and St. Maarten, to open preflight inspection offices.  At these “preclearance” locations, Customs & Border Protection agents inspect travelers for immigration, customs and agriculture requirements before they board U.S.-bound flights.  With successful preflight screening, a foreign traveler normally avoids all screening at his or her U.S. destination airport.  In 2015 ...

This information updates our original post of April 9, 2015.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (“CBP”), which controls admission of travelers to the United States, maintains more than 70 “Deferred Inspection” offices where travelers may request correction of  I-94 Arrival Records they believe were issued incorrectly.

The Department of Homeland Security today announced it will negotiate with ten airports in Belgium, the Dominican Republic, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Turkey, and the United Kingdom to open preflight inspection offices, where U.S. Customs & Border Protection agents will inspect travelers for immigration, customs and agriculture requirements before they board U.S.-bound flights.  After a year-long analysis by DHS, the Department of State, and the Transportation Security Administration, these ten airports were selected, from more than twenty that ...

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (“CBP”), which controls admission of travelers to the United States, maintains more than 70 “Deferred Inspection” offices where travelers may request correction of  I-94 Arrival Records they believe were issued incorrectly.

On April 30, US Customs & Border Protection began a phased elimination of the paper I-94 Admission/Departure Record that visitors to the United States have become so familiar with.

By May 5, CBP will no longer issue paper I-94s at airports in Charlotte, Orlando, Las Vegas, Chicago (O’Hare), Miami, and Houston (IAH).  By May 21, I-94s at all other air and sea ports will be systematically phased out, per the schedule in CBP’s Travel Advisory.  Paper I-94s will continue to be issued at all land ports of entry.

Beginning on May 6, 2013, anyone attending an interview at a local USCIS field office or seeking to obtain evidence of an immigration benefit — e.g., employment authorization document, temporary I-551 stamp, or advance parole travel document — will be required to submit digital fingerprints and photos, under USCIS’s new “Customer Identification Verification” (CIV) program.

This biometric data will be input into the “US VISIT” database and will be available to USCIS for future benefits adjudications, and to USCBP, during primary, secondary and deferred ...

On August 7, 2012, U.S. Customs and Border Protection posted a Travel Update to its website, confirming that CBP agents will systematically stop issuing paper Forms I-94 (Arrival/Departure Records) at all airports and some sea ports of entry in the very near future.  Travelers who enter at land ports of entry will continue to receive paper Forms I-94, until further notice.

DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano announced today that undocumented youth who were brought here as children and who meet certain criteria are now eligible for "deferred action," a form of long-term relief from deportation that allows employment authorization and college attendance, but does not lead to a green card.  Known as DREAMers (after the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act, which Congress has failed to pass each time it has been introduced since 2001), these young people have become increasingly vocal and visible in public protests and in the media.