Priority dates, as they are called by the United States Department of state, are the timeframes issued to visa applicants that indicate when they are able to actually get their Green Cards.
Fortunately for those who win the Green Card Lottery, diversity visa winners do not need to have a priority date and they can immigrate within two years of filing their application.
There are no priority dates do not exist for the Green Card Lottery because there is no wait time. There are only a certain number of visas issued per year and only a certain number of people have the opportunity to apply for them.
On the other hand, many of the other ways one can get a Green Card are high in demand and therefore develop a wait time because there are not enough Green Cards to go around.
Green Cards through employment and most categories of family based visas are in very high demand. Immediate relative visas are issued on an unlimited basis and therefore do not have a wait period.
The wait periods for some family category visas are 24 years old! That means that they have only just now, in January of 2013, started granting immigration visas that were applied for in 1987.
The other routes to getting a green card can take a long period of time.
In many circumstances it may make a great deal of sense to file for a family category and file for the Green Card Lottery.
If you have already filed once with the United States government they can get a good idea of how much you really want to immigrate to the United States. Additionally, there is no penalty for applying for the Green Card Lottery and another program.
Really, one could look at the Green Card Lottery as a lottery for a very fresh priority number, one that is current so that you don’t have to wait.
You can check whether or not you have won the Green Card Lottery in May with your confirmation number. Do not lose your confirmation number because without it you cannot find out your status with the lottery.
The chances of winning the Green Card Lottery are significantly better than winning a cash lottery by many thousands of times. However, it sometimes takes multiple submissions to finally win. By using USAGreenCardLottery.org, you can be sure that your application is filed properly and on time year after year.