August 2007 Visa Bulletin – All EB Visas Unavailable

The Visa Bulletin for August 2007 has been released and the headline for Filipino nurses is that all emploment-based visas are UNAVAILABLE.  Below is the portion of the current Visa Bulletin pertaining to employment-based visas:

NCLEX in Manila begins on August 23, 2007

This news is long time coming.  Early this year, NCSBN already announced that Manila will be the next NCLEX test site.  Now, it’s definite that the NCLEX will be administered in the Philippines beginning August 23, 2007, and those with ATT can already start scheduling tomorrow (July 13, 2007). 

July Visa Bulletin Update

Below is the entire text of the short (but significant) update on the July 2007 Visa Bulletin:

Number 108
Volume IX
Washington, D.C.

UPDATE ON JULY VISA AVAILABILITY

The sudden backlog reduction efforts by Citizenship and Immigration Services Offices during the past month have resulted in the use of almost 60,000 Employment numbers. As a result of this unexpected action it has been necessary to make immediate adjustments to several previously announced cut-off dates.  All Citizenship and Immigration Services Offices have been notified of the following: 

Effective Monday July 2, 2007 there will be no further authorizations in response to requests for Employment-based preference cases.  All numbers available to these categories under the FY-2007 annual numerical limitation have been made available. 

Employment preference numbers will once again be available to these chargeability areas beginning October 1, 2007, under the FY-2008 annual numerical limitation.  

Department of State Publication 9514
CA/VO: July 2, 2007

Basically, this means that the visa allocation for employment-based visa has been used up for the FY 2007.  On October 2007, the new fiscal year would kick in and provide the annual quota for employment-based visas (as well as other types of visas).

Top Ten Internet Scams

I’m pleasantly surprised to see this list on the POEA website but find it very useful to have a list of internet scams.  A couple of years ago, I’ve actually been awaken in the middle of the night by my wife saying she won US2 Million (and she’s got a master’s degree) through a lottery prize via e-mail.