POE - How much time to allow (IR1)

[lirpa11 16]

Hi fellow VJ'ers!

I have a quick question please.

We have just been approved for the IR1 visa (YAY!). My husband is looking at leaving Australia and heading to the USA to join me (and our growing baby in my belly) in 4 weeks. I am wondering how long should we allow at his POE?

I would be happy with an hour and a half, however I know previously when he had to go through the immigration lines as a tourist and it always took a bit longer than the citizenship line.

How much time should we allow at his first stop as a stopover? Is 3 hours enough? Should we allow 4 hours? He has the visa in his passport, I will pay the $165 IV fee next week so that will go through, and he has the sealed envelope from immigration.

I obviously want the shortest wait time possible as he will be going from Perth to Sydney to Los Angeles (POE) and then onto Atlanta.

Thanks, and your advice is appreciated!

[Cathi 5,609]

No one can tell you with any certainty how long it will take. Time varies greatly depending on the airport, time of day, how many others are entering at the same time, how many questions they decide to ask. Took my husband about a half hour in Boston. Maybe others who went through LA will chime in yo give you their experiences. Good luck and congrats on the baby

[CowBoE 429]

My wife was stuck in Houston airport POE for 4 hours because they had misplaced her passport.

Good thing it was the final destination, otherwise, she would have missed the connection flight.

If Atlanta is your final destination, then the best thing to do is to find a flight

where Atlanta is the first US city...in other words, if there will be connecting flight,

let that be at another country.

You want to avoid landing in non-final destination US city and go through POE

as much as possible...but if you have to...then I suggest minimum 4+ hours of connection time gap.

[Aldi & James 2]

If you have the visa and passport and everything looks legitimate, I'm not sure why it would take longer than a typical foreigner with a tourist visa. They didn't do any secondary interview for my husband, the only wait was in the non-citizen/visa line. Ours was at O'Hare, however, which is pretty quick for immigration travel. I assumed it would take him at least an hour to get through the line, but he was done in 15-30 minutes.

[Pitaya 2,576]

Took my then-fiancee and her son ~ 2 hours at their POE.

YMMV

[TBoneTX 43,020]

Consider this: Better to have too much time and no rush than the converse.

[lirpa11 16]

Thanks, we will allow 4 hours. LAX is almost always the first US city. No flights currently go from Australia to Atlanta when he is flying. We have used connecting flights in China and Japan previously to save money but that adds 10 + hours onto travel time. Which we don't want. I have seen flights through dubai for an extra $3, 000... but we need that money and get cheaper flight.

Thanks. Ill keep looking and be sure to allow at least 4 hours at his first POE.