The ARRL Volunteer Examiner Coordinator said today that the FCC has begun processing Amateur Radio applications for the first time since early January, when it shut down because of the lapse in funding.

“The FCC worked through its backlog very quickly, and started processing our files about noon today,” Assistant ARRL VEC Manager Amanda Grimaldi, N1NHL, said on Wednesday. “We’re slowly submitting the files we have in queue — we don’t want to bombard them! Assuming there are no hiccups, everyone should see their applications processed by the close of business on Thursday.”

The ARRL VEC had piled up some 2,700 pending Amateur Radio applications, many of them from 425 ARRL VEC examination sessions that took place during the shutdown or immediately prior to it. These do not include files that the other 13 VECs may have ready to upload to the FCC.