New visa bulletin released

The Department of State recently released the July 2008 visa bulletin.

For those of you who are new to the "visa bulletin" or don't know what it is, the visa bulletin is a report issued by the Department of State about the current backlog or waiting time for immigrant visas. In order to use the bulletin you need to first determine the category in which your case falls or what "preference" the case is. There are two categories of preferences: family-based and employment-based. There are 4 preferences in the family-based category and five in the employment-based category. First determine which preference you case falls in and then look at the chart in your category and find your preference and appropriate country. The date listed is the "priority date" or receipt date on the petition that is currently being processed. For example, if the date says June 2002, this means that they are currently processing cases that were received in June 2002. In other words, there is a 6 year wait.