Every adjudicative body I have ever dealt with, from government agencies to the Supreme Court, provide proof of filing documents. Today I met the exception. I delivered documents for a case as requested by USCIS to the San Diego USCIS office. I gave the packet to an officer at a window. I brought two copies – one for him and one for me. I asked him to stamp or otherwise verify on my copy that he received it. He said that USCIS does not do that anymore. “He is not allowed to!,” he said (exclamation point added). He showed me a little green log book he was logging the submission in and that served as the proof of my delivering the packet.
If this is indeed a new policy, then it is a very stupid policy. If in a few weeks USCIS asserts it did not receive what I hand-delivered today, how can I prove that I delivered it? How do I know what he wrote in the little green book? If it is not the policy not to give proof of receipt of documents and some Tucker Carlson-looking guy is making things up, then educate him and show him how to use the receipt stamping machine. Also, monitor him to make sure he is not making all kinds of other things up.
Don’t worry, you say. If you delivered it, USCIS has it and everything will work out. That USCIS misplaces documents is a given – everyone has been known to misplace documents. USCIS even has a regulation, 8 CFR § 103.5(a)(2)(ii), contemplating losing or overlooking evidence. Why remove a simple and commonplace protection for customers of USCIS? Riddle me that, USCIS. Posted April 3, 2015.