Your Notice to Appear: what it must say, and what to check first

A Notice to Appear, Form I-862, is the charging document in immigration court. When the government files it with the court, your removal case begins and the immigration judge takes over the case (8 C.F.R. 1003.14). If an asylum officer referred your application to court, this is the paper that tells you so.

Most people read the first page and put it in a drawer. Read all of it, the day it arrives. Three things on it control your next steps: what it says about you, the address it lists, and the hearing date and place.

What the law says it must contain

The statute lists seven things a Notice to Appear must tell you (INA 239(a)(1)(A) to (G)):

1. The nature of the proceedings against you.
2. The legal authority for the proceedings.
3. The acts or conduct the government says broke the law.
4. The charges and the provisions of law you are said to have violated.
5. That you may be represented by a lawyer, and the time you have to find one.
6. That you must give the court your address and report any change, and what happens if you do not.
7. The time and place of the hearing, and what happens if you do not appear.

Item three, the factual allegations, is what the judge will ask you to admit or deny at your first hearing. Item four, the charge, is the legal reason the government says you can be removed. A lawyer reads both lines closely, because a wrong fact or a wrong charge is something you can contest.

The address on the Notice

Look at the address before anything else. If it is missing or wrong, you must file Form EOIR-33 with the immigration court within five days. The same five days apply every time you move (8 C.F.R. 1003.15(d)).

Some other details on the Notice are listed in the regulations as informational only. Getting one of those wrong does not by itself give you a right to anything (8 C.F.R. 1003.15(c)). The address duty is different: it falls on you.

The 10-day rule and your first hearing

Your first hearing cannot be scheduled earlier than 10 days after the Notice is served on you, unless you ask in writing for an earlier date (INA 239(b)(1)). The Notice has a "Request for Prompt Hearing" box for that. Those 10 days are there so you can find a lawyer. In 2026 the Board of Immigration Appeals said that 10-day rule is the only fixed time requirement the law sets to protect your chance to get counsel, so do not count on a long delay after that (Matter of A-K-R-, 29 I&N Dec. 839 (BIA 2026)).

That first hearing is a master calendar hearing. Our post on the master calendar hearing walks through it.

When the time or place is missing

For years, many Notices to Appear said the date and time were "to be set." The Supreme Court has addressed that three times:

The stop-time rule matters for some forms of relief, not for asylum itself. Whether a defective Notice helps you depends on what relief you are seeking and on every notice you received afterward. That is a lawyer's question, not a do-it-yourself one.

What to do this week

• Check the address. If it is wrong, file the EOIR-33 within five days.
• Write down the hearing date, time and court. Our New York courts post lists the addresses.
• Read the factual allegations line by line and mark anything that is wrong.
• Gather your I-589, receipt notices and any other papers from USCIS or the court.
• Put the dates into our deadline calculator to see the filing deadlines before your hearing.

Talk to a lawyer about your own case

A Notice to Appear is the start of a trial, and the papers you file in the first weeks shape everything after. If you have received one, talk to an immigration lawyer before your first hearing, and bring the Notice with you.