Thanks for the input. I had also suspected that the government's back-end data synchronization procedures might not be exactly real time. I'll keep trying to update the Global Entry information page as well and report back.

As for the passport application, it's possible that Certified Mail, as opposed to Priority Mail, may have helped since certification requires essentially immediate manual processing in the form of a "received" signature or rubber stamp together with mailing back the little green postcard.

And for most people, by the way, the best way of knowing the fate of an application is seeing when the check is cashed through an online banking application. Everything else comes close to being just (inaccurate) noise, or at least that's what I think.