Duplicate H-1B Registrations Plummet in Wake of Lottery Overhaul

Multiple lottery registrations for single workers fell by 88% January regulations changed agency’s selection process Duplicate submissions for individual workers in the annual H-1B visa lottery cratered after the government revamped the selection process for the specialty occupation visas this year. Eligible registrations for individual workers with multiple lottery submissions filed on their behalf by employers dropped by more than 88% from last year, according to data released Tuesday by US Citizenship and Immigration Services. Overall, eligible registrations for the fiscal year 2025 visa lottery fell by about 38% from the previous year. USCIS regulations finalized in January based lottery selections on each individual beneficiary, rather than the number of registrations submitted on their behalf. Only employers with selected registrations can move forward with filing visa petitions. The agency said last year that a spike in duplicate submissions reflected some companies’ attempts to game the lottery system by colluding to file multiple registrations for single workers. While beneficiaries can have multiple registrations made on their behalf by employers, they must reflect legitimate job offers. The revamped process offered some hope to employers that they would have better prospects of landing one of the 85,000 new slots available each year for the visas, which are heavily used in the tech industry. Roughly 47,000 eligible registrations were submitted this year for foreign workers with multiple registrations filed on their behalf, compared to more than 408,000 in 2023, USCIS said. Those submissions accounted for about a tenth of the 470,342 eligible registrations overall. In the previous year, those duplicate entries accounted for well over half of total lottery entries. The number of unique beneficiaries and unique employers participating in the lottery this year was comparable to 2023, according to USCIS. For more information, visit us at https://www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com/.