Quick Questions before I file...

[WhiteFox 7]

I'm getting my package ready to file in early August, and I was a bit worried about the evidence I have for our relationship, I'm afraid I have too little...Here's what I have so far:

• Tax transcripts for 2013, 2014 and 2015
• Quarterly copies of our bank statements from our marriage to now showing joint ownership
• Copies our of shared debit cards from same bank
• Affidavit from our US citizen employer attesting to our employment and relationship
• Affidavit from 2 US citizen friends attesting to our relationship
• Copies of Christmas cards and packages showing addresses from friends and family
• Various photos

I don't have any utilites in both of our names, just most in my name and one in his. Should I include those?

Our home is rented from my parents on their land. We don't have a written rent agreement since we have a good realtionship. Should my parents write one up anyway just to show them something, or is it not good evidence since they aren't a 3rd party?

Also, when sending copies of debit cards does anyone black out the numbers for security? Or does the USCIS not care..?

Thanks for your help, always appreciated.

[arken 4,197]

Seems like you have enough relevant materials especially the joint account and i believe the joint tax returns.

I would suggest you have a write up from your parents mentioning the stay of you two their house and no written lease.

You might wanna black out all but the last 4 digits on the debit card copies if you are sending those too.

[Daveykins 17]

What about insurance? Life insurances with eachother as beneficiary? Auto insurance?

Just so you know, affadavits are secondary evidence and are not primary. Basically, they're only useful if you have rock solid primary evidence usually financial evidence is best.

Utility bills are secondary evidence as well, but can't hurt including them.

Make sure you put details of where each photo was taken/date/who is in the photo.

[WhiteFox 7]

Arken, Happy Chic, Daveykins, thank you for your replies.

I can include those separate utilities, and I'll have my parents write an affidavit.

Unforutnantly I don't have any helpful car insurance info, he does not drive so he is not on my car insurance and he doesn't have a car or license. I wanted to put him down as co owner of our car when we bought it, but I had to apply for a loan with a co-borrower (not my husband) so the co-borrower had to be put down as the co owner instead of my husband.

I have Medi-Cal/CenCal health as my health insurance, and I have 2 identity cards with our names separately on each card. Would this be acceptable? The cards do not have our addressses on it and our names are not together.

[Illiria 980]

Definitely use the utility bills showing different names but same address, the health insurance cards showing different names but same policy number and as you don't have a lease the affidavit of your living arrangement with your parents.

Can your husband get a state id from the dmv? Before I could get round to taking the test I got the state id so I didn't have to use my green card for id when buying alcohol. This way he has a dmv issued ID card that will be with same address as your drivers license.

[WhiteFox 7]

Happy Chic and Illira, I don't think my health insurance cards have a policy number on them, both cards have "ID Numbers" that are different for each of us. They look like THIS.

I can include the cards anyway, though.

I can definitely try to get a State ID, I have never thought of this before. Our file date would August 2nd, does it hurt to have filed a few weeks after that to allow the card to be mailed?

[jjbandero 39]

If August 2nd is at the beginning of your 90 day window to file, then it doesn't hurt to wait a little longer to get the ID. Since you don't have car insurance, what about other types of insurance e.g. home content insurance? Life insurance? 401K where he is a beneficiary? These are all good 3rd party documents to have. When we filed, we also included other "official" mail that was not necessarily addressed to both of us, but had the same mailing address on it, e.g. I include bills from health insurance, Social Security statements, my husband included his jury summons.

[WhiteFox 7]

JJbandero, yes August 2nd is the beginning of our 90 day window. Unfortunantly no, we have no other insurance at all, we haven't done much since our 2 years of getting married. We don't have a 401k and we are too young to get Social Security, and have not received any jury summons...

I'm worried that if I send what I have and I get an RFE I won't have much more to send. I can print more bank statements instead of quarterly ones, maybe? I can apply for a credit card, since I recently got an offer for one in the mail for us, would that help?

[jjbandero 39]

JJbandero, yes August 2nd is the beginning of our 90 day window. Unfortunantly no, we have no other insurance at all, we haven't done much since our 2 years of getting married. We don't have a 401k and we are too young to get Social Security, and have not received any jury summons...

I'm worried that if I send what I have and I get an RFE I won't have much more to send. I can print more bank statements instead of quarterly ones, maybe? I can apply for a credit card, since I recently got an offer for one in the mail for us, would that help?

I agree with the other poster, getting a credit card now would not be much help, however, in the long run it will be a good idea to help build credit history for your spouse.

While you can print more bank statements, if it's for the same account, it would not matter that much, just make sure you have recent ones included. Have you made any big purchases for the both of you from the account? For example, you took a trip somewhere? If so, perhaps you can include the itinerary, hotel stay receipts etc.

Getting a will and power of attorney done can be relatively easy and good to have in life anyway, you should look into that.

For clarification, the Social Security statements I mentioned were not for benefits received, I seem to get these statements that show how much I have contributed through my taxes, I believe it is for informational purposes and I held on to them.

[Gilda 2]

Happy Chic and Illira, I don't think my health insurance cards have a policy number on them, both cards have "ID Numbers" that are different for each of us. They look like THIS.

I can include the cards anyway, though.

You can try to get a coverage verification letter from the insurance company or your employer (if you get health insurance through employment) that says you're both on the same policy. I'm on my husband's policy, but both of our insurance cards only have his name on them, so he got a letter from his employer verifying that I'm on his policy.

[WhiteFox 7]

JJbandero, I did stay at a hotel last year with him, but on my confirmation email it only has my name on it. Should I include this too, or are they only looking for things that have both our names on it?

Happy Chic, I will definitely look into making a will, thank you for pointing me in that direction.

Gilda, I'm unsure if I am able to do that for my insurance because what I have is government funded, not a private company and I'm not sure if that is available?

[dhlunar 25]

I believe when they finally get around to looking at your ROC petition, they pull your full file, so the officer will have everything that you ever submitted to USCIS. How was your AOS? When you went for AOS did you submit a lot of evidence back then?

When my wife file for ROC in 2012, we submitted some pictures, a letter from the credit card company showing we both were on the account, a letter from the assistant property manger for the place we were renting from since our one year lease expired and we were month-to-month, a couple of bank statements showing we had a joint savings account, and a couple of pictures from our honeymoon and the celebration that we had in my wife's birth country. Personally, I thought we didn't submit enough evidence at ROC, however, we submitted a bunch of evidence at AOS, that the officer at AOS said our case was an easy case and was able to approve it on the spot. SInce Vermont was backed up it took 9 months for the ROC to be reviewed, but when it was my wife got a letter in the mail saying it was approved and the new 10-year card came the next day.

[madtownguy 164]

You have much more than we submitted. We basically sent like 10 photos, and marriage cert. I think I may have sent joint tax return, possibly not though. We still don't have a bill in both our names, or joint bank accounts.

[jjbandero 39]

JJbandero, I did stay at a hotel last year with him, but on my confirmation email it only has my name on it. Should I include this too, or are they only looking for things that have both our names on it?

Happy Chic, I will definitely look into making a will, thank you for pointing me in that direction.

Gilda, I'm unsure if I am able to do that for my insurance because what I have is government funded, not a private company and I'm not sure if that is available?

It's better if it has both of your names on it or you can easily trace back to the fact that you were both there. For example, you have a jointed bank account, you paid for a trip using the joint account, you have hotel and airline receipts with your names and same destination, and you add pictures on top of that to tell a story of the two of you together and sharing finances. This is more of an indirect way, since you don't have some of the other direct examples of financial co-mingling.

You don't have to answer this question, I understand that the IOs look for red flags in the relationship, and it can be things like coming from vastly different religions, large age differences, not speaking the same language at all etc. If you have these flags, you need to prepared for a lot of scrutiny, if you don't, then the standard doesn't seem to be as high. There are examples of other members on this board who got approved without a ton of evidence.

Good luck

[WhiteFox 7]

Ok everyone! I've compiled everything I think we need so far and I'm in better shape then before I think:

• Copy of the tax statement for 2012, 2013 and 2014
• Copies of our bank statements
• Copies of utility bills
• Copy of our visa cards showing a joint account
• Copy of our health insurance cards
• Copy of our joint lease
  Copy of driving record showing physical address
• One sworn affidavit from our U.S. citizen employer, attesting to our relationship, marriage and employment
• One sworn affidavit by our U.S. citizen friend, attesting to our relationship and marriage
• Copies of Christmas cards from friends and family
• Photos of us

​

I ran into an interesting problem and found a solution that hopefully would benefit someone else: On going to get a ID Card from the DMV (with the goal of getting the card with the physical address on it) the clerk said that we could NOT put down our physical address if our mailing address was different. Since we don't get mail at our physical we were forced to put down the PO Box, but she was able to print us out his driving record copy, which does show both mailing and physical addresses. The driving record is printed on DMV letterhead so I assume this would be a good document to show the USCIS as evidence. I hope this can help someone else too.

Thank you for all the help everyone, we really appreciate it! I'm going to send this off soon, so please wish me luck.