I've been waiting on a form 4 transfer since April. A few months ago I was thinking it should be right around the corner from approval. Wrong, current wait times are about 9 months. Which is honestly ridiculous.

The BATFE recently rolled out the e-form system which allows dealers AND individuals to submit their forms via electronic delivery. One approved, the ATF sends a scanned image of your tax stamp and you are all set.

I was following some threads online where people reported 3 month turnarounds using the e-forms. I was somewhat shocked as to how this could happen but I will consolidate my research with paragraph below:

From what I read, the ATF was "testing" their electronic system and pushed a batch of forms through. The "test" took 3 months and because of that we should not expect 3 months as the standard wait time.

On one hand, I'm not surprised that a government operated entity is that inefficient. If this revenue generating operation was being performed by a private enterprise wait times would be weeks and revenue would increase 10 fold.

On the other hand, I'm confused with the fact forms CAN be processed in 3 months, yet we are still waiting 9+ months. With that type of wait, it puts many things in jeopardy. In 9 months people die, businesses go under, children are born and host of other things which make a 9+ month wait unacceptable.