Highlights:
THE US is set to make online filing mandatory for immigration benefits including green card applications, citizenship requests and asylum claims, as part of a move to improve efficiency and reduce operational costs.
The US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), in a new rule published in the Federal Register on Monday (10), said applicants will be required to use online filing for any form that has been available for e-filing for at least 180 days.
The rule will also establish a process allowing the agency to make forms available online only after giving at least 60 days’ notice.
The change could affect a wide range of immigration benefits, including green card applications and renewals, family-based petitions, citizenship requests, asylum claims, employment authorization applications and Temporary Protected Status filings.
Applicants will generally submit filings through a USCIS online account either by completing the form online or uploading a PDF version of the completed form and supporting evidence. The USCIS said the rule is intended to speed up its transition away from paper-based processing and reduce reliance on the Treasury Department’s lockbox service, which receives and processes applications sent by mail.
The agency said electronic filing would improve efficiency, reduce errors, and strengthen fraud detection and security screening by making immigration data easier to access and analyze. People who are unable to file online can request an exemption by filing a new form. The USCIS will review such requests and grant waivers on a case-by-case basis.
In such cases, applicants will have to pay $25 as filing charges. In fiscal year 2025, the USCIS processed more than 14 million benefit requests, while lockbox facilities handled approximately 453 million pages of paper submissions.
The USCIS spent approximately $396 million operating lockbox intake systems and more than $10m on postage costs alone.
The Department of Homeland Security believes mandatory e-filing will reduce the costs associated with manual handling, data entry, shipping, storage and scanning while accelerating adjudication workflows.
