I have a couple customers - lets call them John and James Smith. John had seven eforms in play and James had two. John was on 330 days or so, James wasn't much behind him. I did the eforms personally so I know they were filed properly. Here is their story. *insert Law and Order 'dum-dum' here*
So I was getting a little miffed at the ATF for taking so long, so (back in March) I called and was told that both these individuals were on a NICS delay hold for their background checks. One has a common name, one is not so common. One was using a UPIN. The ATF said there was nothing they could do, they're waiting on FBI to return the background search to clear the form 1s/4s and issue approvals. Time goes on, and on... and on, and I'm starting to get pissed.
These people had paid for their suppressors / form 1s / etc almost a year ago, and they're still sitting in my safe due to a technical bottleneck at the FBI. So I email the NICS Liaison with a strongly worded yet polite email, noting that I would contact the Indiana Attorney General and state senators regarding this issue, and told them they had five business days to reply before I kicked the tires into high gear. Twenty minutes later my phone rings from a blocked number.
A very nice gentleman from the FBI called, and I was educated on the technicalities of doing background checks for NFA items. When a person gets delayed on a 4473, the gun shop has the option to transfer the firearm after three business days (at their discretion) to the individual. Some do, some don't, I'm not going to argue that point now, but I always do. On an NFA form, that three day hold doesn't apply (obviously) and the 'further research' delay is forwarded to a specific department that researches the individual. It's the same department that does the 4473 checks, EXCEPT the further research query goes to the back of the research pile... of 100,000 current NFA searches in line... and they're working on NICS research checks from May 2023 currently. Also, a UPIN doesn't put you at the front of the line. You go to the back of the line with everyone else.
After talking to this nice gentleman - note, I really do mean that, he was quite pleasant - he manually approved nine background checks for John and James. He told me they would be submitted to ATF at the end of the day, and he had no control over the approval times on their end. He said it could be several more months before the ATF cleared the forms. This morning, at 7am, my email was stacked with approvals for both these individuals, and will continue to fill throughout the day when the rest come back. There were also approvals sent for items John had at other guns shops too, which is nice.
So - where are I going with this? I'll tell you the nicsliaison@fbi.gov email works. It's amazing what you can get accomplished by not being a total d*ck but stating your case firmly and politely. This guy at the FBI didn't need to help me, he didn't even need to reply to my email, but he did, and we got the issue resolved (to the tune of nine approved stamps). Don't bash those guys, they're quite nice and it's not their fault the system is set up with bottlenecks at this point. Take the current lead times with a grain of salt, it could be very fast, or it could be a while. Either way, I'll call and pester the FBI again if I need to. Totally worth it.
-Asz
So I was getting a little miffed at the ATF for taking so long, so (back in March) I called and was told that both these individuals were on a NICS delay hold for their background checks. One has a common name, one is not so common. One was using a UPIN. The ATF said there was nothing they could do, they're waiting on FBI to return the background search to clear the form 1s/4s and issue approvals. Time goes on, and on... and on, and I'm starting to get pissed.
These people had paid for their suppressors / form 1s / etc almost a year ago, and they're still sitting in my safe due to a technical bottleneck at the FBI. So I email the NICS Liaison with a strongly worded yet polite email, noting that I would contact the Indiana Attorney General and state senators regarding this issue, and told them they had five business days to reply before I kicked the tires into high gear. Twenty minutes later my phone rings from a blocked number.
A very nice gentleman from the FBI called, and I was educated on the technicalities of doing background checks for NFA items. When a person gets delayed on a 4473, the gun shop has the option to transfer the firearm after three business days (at their discretion) to the individual. Some do, some don't, I'm not going to argue that point now, but I always do. On an NFA form, that three day hold doesn't apply (obviously) and the 'further research' delay is forwarded to a specific department that researches the individual. It's the same department that does the 4473 checks, EXCEPT the further research query goes to the back of the research pile... of 100,000 current NFA searches in line... and they're working on NICS research checks from May 2023 currently. Also, a UPIN doesn't put you at the front of the line. You go to the back of the line with everyone else.
After talking to this nice gentleman - note, I really do mean that, he was quite pleasant - he manually approved nine background checks for John and James. He told me they would be submitted to ATF at the end of the day, and he had no control over the approval times on their end. He said it could be several more months before the ATF cleared the forms. This morning, at 7am, my email was stacked with approvals for both these individuals, and will continue to fill throughout the day when the rest come back. There were also approvals sent for items John had at other guns shops too, which is nice.
So - where are I going with this? I'll tell you the nicsliaison@fbi.gov email works. It's amazing what you can get accomplished by not being a total d*ck but stating your case firmly and politely. This guy at the FBI didn't need to help me, he didn't even need to reply to my email, but he did, and we got the issue resolved (to the tune of nine approved stamps). Don't bash those guys, they're quite nice and it's not their fault the system is set up with bottlenecks at this point. Take the current lead times with a grain of salt, it could be very fast, or it could be a while. Either way, I'll call and pester the FBI again if I need to. Totally worth it.
-Asz
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