Every Green Card in the United States is mailed from one place: a secure USCIS card production facility in Lee’s Summit, Missouri, near Kansas City.1U.S. General Services Administration. Kansas City Is Home to Nationwide Processing of Immigration Documents Individual USCIS field offices do not print or ship cards. Once your case is approved, the Lee’s Summit facility produces the card and hands it to the U.S. Postal Service for delivery to the address USCIS has on file.
How the Card Travels to You
USCIS ships Green Cards through what it calls the Secure Mail Initiative. Cards move by USPS Priority Mail with delivery confirmation, which generates a tracking number and requires a signature at the door.2U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. How to Track Delivery of Your Notice or Secure Identity Document (or Card) Since 2018, USCIS has used USPS Signature Confirmation Restricted Delivery for these mailings. The carrier will ask for photo identification before releasing the envelope.3U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. USCIS to Begin Using More Secure Mail Delivery Service
If you won’t be home for the delivery attempt, you can name someone to sign for you by filing USPS PS Form 3801 (Standing Delivery Order) with your local post office. Your agent presents their own photo ID and accepts the envelope.4U.S. Postal Service. PS Form 3801 – Standing Delivery Order
Make Sure USCIS Has Your Current Address
This is where deliveries most often go wrong. The card ships to whatever address is on file when it’s produced. If you moved after filing and never updated your address, it goes to the old one. Nobody calls to check.
Federal law requires most noncitizens in the United States to report a move to USCIS within 10 days. Holders of A and G visas and Visa Waiver Program visitors are the exceptions.5U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. How to Change Your Address The fastest way to update is through your USCIS online account, because it pushes the new address into USCIS systems automatically and lets you tie the change to each pending receipt number. Filing Form AR-11 online also satisfies the legal requirement.6U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. AR-11 – Alien’s Change of Address Card A paper AR-11 meets the law but doesn’t automatically update pending cases, so USCIS discourages it.
Tracking the Delivery
Once your card is produced, your case status updates to show that the card was mailed, and a USPS tracking number becomes available. If you have a USCIS online account, the tracking number appears there. If not, use the Case Status Online tool with your 13-character receipt number from any USCIS notice.7U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Non-Delivery of Card Plug that number into USPS tracking to follow the package. Cards typically arrive within a few days to a couple of weeks after the “card was mailed” status.
USCIS also suggests signing up for USPS Informed Delivery, a free service that emails you daily images of incoming mail so you know when a USCIS envelope is on the way.2U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. How to Track Delivery of Your Notice or Secure Identity Document (or Card)
If the Card Doesn’t Arrive
Start with the tracking number. If USPS shows the package as delivered but you don’t have it, check with others at your address and call your local post office. Carriers sometimes hold restricted-delivery items at the post office instead of making a second attempt.
If tracking shows nothing useful, USCIS asks that you wait at least 90 days after your approval notice before filing a non-delivery inquiry. You can submit that inquiry through the USCIS e-Request tool with your receipt number, A-number if you have one, and filing date, or call the USCIS Contact Center.7U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Non-Delivery of Card
Replacement With No Fee
If USPS returned the card to USCIS as undeliverable, or if the card was printed with wrong information because of a DHS error, the fee to reissue is $0 on the current USCIS fee schedule.8U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. G-1055 Fee Schedule Contact USCIS through the e-Request tool or the Contact Center to confirm your current address and ask that the card be sent again.
Replacement With a Fee
If the card was delivered somewhere and simply lost, you’ll need to file Form I-90 (Application to Replace Permanent Resident Card) and pay the filing fee: $415 online or $465 on paper.8U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. G-1055 Fee Schedule There is no separate biometrics fee; USCIS folded that cost into the filing fee in 2024.9U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Frequently Asked Questions on the USCIS Fee Rule Some applicants may qualify for a fee waiver through Form I-912.
Proof of Status While You Wait
Waiting weeks for a card can be a problem if you need to work or travel. If you entered the country on an immigrant visa, the machine-readable immigrant visa stamped in your passport works as a temporary I-551 (the official name for a Green Card) for one year from your admission date, and employers must accept it as proof of identity and work authorization.10U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Temporary I-551 Stamps and MRIVs If you adjusted status inside the United States and your card still hasn’t arrived, you can visit a USCIS field office, generally by InfoPass appointment where available, and request a temporary I-551 stamp in your passport. That stamp matters most if you need to travel internationally before the physical card shows up, because airlines and border officers need to see evidence of permanent resident status.