I'm a first-time poster but I feel like this is a community that I will be visiting often now that I have, 1) found this wonderful site, and 2) am beginning the visa process for my wife.

Let me introduce myself and this might help to kinda steer the answers towards my case. I'm an American citizen living in Japan and I just got married back in April to my beautiful (Japanese) wife. I have lived here for over 6 months, which makes me eligible for DCF. We just took the first trip to Tokyo about 10 days ago to submit the first packet of forms (I-130, I-129F, DS-230, I-864, and G-325 and other supporting documents) and we received a letter in the mail today giving us information about how to apply for immigration to the US (entitled "Immigrant Visa Instructions"). It basically states that our IV petition has been approved and that if we want to be admitted to the US as a LPR, we can now begin applying for our IV.

Question 1: Is this letter that we received the first NOA (notice of action) receipt? I'm thinking not because it doesn't have a receipt number, but rather just a case number. This case number is 3 letters followed by a series of 10 numbers (i.e. TKY1234567890). This confuses me because supposedly this is the same format as the receipt number that I feel we should have received with it. (Side note: I tried typing this in to the case status page thing at the USCIS web page and it gave me an error, even after I followed all of the directions to enter it in correctly...huh?)

Question 2: Is there anywhere that details all of the timeline entries and what exactly they are? I looked and couldn't find anything.

I'm sorry if I posted this in the wrong place but, I have an excuse...I'm still a beginner!

Well, your question belongs in the DCF forum but the notice of action looks like the equivalent of NOA2 for other cases, in that it is your approval notice. It says "approved" right? Just follow the instructions.

Looks like you are on a nice fast track. Congratulations.

Welcome to VJ

That's a bit confusing about being told to apply for the visa when they've already accepted the DS-230 from your wife - which is really the visa application - and the I-864. I would contact the embassy if you don't have a response from someone here who did DCF specifically in Japan.

EDIT - About the USCIS case site - you can't track it there since you're going through the embassy in Japan.

Thanks you guys. I really appreciate the replies! I'll make sure to begin posting in the DCF forum from now on and I'll try to find someone that has done DCF through Tokyo. THANKS!!