November 22, 2022
Good morning,
We’d like to share a message we received from NICS regarding their holiday hours:
This year for the Thanksgiving holiday, the NICS Contracted Call Center (NCCC) will operate on normal business hours for both Thanksgiving Day, November 24, 2022, and Black Friday, November 25, 2022. Normal hours of operation are 8 a.m. to 12 a.m. Eastern Time (ET).
Due to the Christmas holiday, the NCCC will be closed beginning at 6 p.m. ET on December 24, 2022, and will be back in operation at 8 a.m. ET on December 26, 2022.
For your convenience, all electronic background check submissions, including the NICS E-Check and XML traffic, will be available 24/7, to include Christmas Day.
Please understand, we try to handle all incoming transactions as efficiently as possible; however, it is not always possible to avoid hold times on the telephone. In addition, our current phone system processes incoming calls on a first in, first handled basis. There is no need for a Federal Firearm Licensee (FFL) to contact the NCCC from a second phone line while on hold for the initial call as this will not expedite service.
In the unlikely event of a NICS outage between 6 p.m. Christmas Eve through Christmas Day, the system will remain unavailable until 8 a.m. Monday, December 26, 2022.