U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced today that its service centers will begin accepting credit card payments for nearly all form filing fees as part of its credit card payment pilot program.
Beginning today, USCIS service centers will accept credit card payments for all form filing fees using Form G-1450, Authorization for Credit Card Transactions, with the notable exception of Form I-129, Petition for a Nonimmigrant Worker, for H-1B and H-2A petitions.
USCIS will evaluate the results at the end of the pilot period and determine the next steps for expanding credit card payment options for other forms. USCIS says the goal of this pilot “is to bring USCIS one step closer to accepting digital payments using a credit card at all service centers.”
USCIS has struggled with modernization efforts in information technology and implementing electronic filing, with budget overages, product delays, and software defects still plaguing the e-File system, despite billions of dollars in investment. The electronic filing system (officially the Electronic Immigration System, or ELIS) was supposed to be completed in 2013. To date, only 12 forms are available to file online of the 101 USCIS forms in publication.