If your F-1 status has ended, you may not need to restart your program. We compile your academic file and coordinate with your university. An independent, licensed attorney assesses eligibility and files your reinstatement request.
USCIS works from a set list. How long you have been out of status, and whether that is under five months when the request is filed. Whether the violation was repeated or deliberate. Whether you are studying, or about to study, full time at the school that issued your I-20.
Whether you have worked without permission. Whether anything apart from the status violation itself would make you removable. And whether what happened was outside your control, or being refused reinstatement would cause you extreme hardship.
These come from the reinstatement regulation, not from us. Your attorney is the one who applies them to your situation makes sure the record in front of them is complete. We gather your academic history, enrollment proof and the documents that explain what happened, and work with your DSO on your reinstatement I-20.
Your school has to issue a new I-20 marked for reinstatement. We coordinate that directly.
Transcripts, enrollment history, financial evidence and a clear account of what happened, all in one place.
Your program, your registration and your DSO stay coordinated while the request is with your attorney.
You stay in the United States and ask USCIS to restore your status on the record you already have. Your previous time counts, and there is no new SEVIS fee.
You go home, your school issues a new record, you pay the SEVIS fee again, and you return on a new I-20. No USCIS decision to wait on, but you start from zero.
Your attorney. Weighing one route against the other depends on your history and your risk, and that is legal work. Omar & Co Consulting is not a law firm and does not make that call.
USCIS works from a set list. How long you have been out of status, and whether that is under five months when the request is filed. Whether the violation was repeated or deliberate. Whether you are studying, or about to study, full time at the school that issued your I-20.
Whether you have worked without permission. Whether anything apart from the status violation itself would make you removable. And whether what happened was outside your control, or being refused reinstatement would cause you extreme hardship.
These come from the reinstatement regulation, not from us. Your attorney is the one who applies them to your situation. What we do is make sure the record in front of them is complete.
The five-month window runs from the date your status ended, not the date you found out.
An independent licensed attorney looks at what happened and advises whether reinstatement or another route fits.
We work with your school so a new I-20 is issued marked for reinstatement, with your enrollment recorded correctly.
Transcripts, enrollment history, financial documents and a clear account of what happened, organized and indexed.
Your attorney prepares Form I-539 and files the request. We keep your academic side moving while it is pending.
USCIS decides every reinstatement request on its own criteria. What we control is a complete and accurate academic record.
