Case Approved - AOS interview experience Houston office

[Katherine93 30]

We had our AOS interview on Thursday 12/8 and was approved for green card. I have received a lot of help from this forum so I wanted to share my own experience that may be helpful to anyone in the future.

My specific timeline is in my signature. Long story short that my husband (USC) and I (adjusted from F1 visa) have been married for 1 year and 9 months and been together for over 3 years. We are located in Houston, TX. We are about the same age 22/23

Our interview appointment was at 12:45 pm, we arrived 10 mins before as my husband could not get off until noon. We went through security and everyone was asked to power off all electronic devices and put them away. We sat in the lobby with about 40 other couples and waited for over 1.5 hours before my name was called...then the IO who was a mid-aged hispanic looking lady took us to her office. She had a thick stack of file that included everything that we already submitted. She took our DLs, my passport and my husband's birth certificate. I had to explain to her why my husband didn't change his address on his DL after we moved (it's our old apt address on his), but she didn't seem to care. She also took my new i693 envelope as my old medical expired after 1 year. She then started by verifying the information on the i130 and i485 forms and put check marks on there as we answered. She asked my husband most of the questions...I was kinda worried about that as my husband is very careless and extremely forgetful. I was afraid that he was gonna mess up a date or something lol Below are some questions that I remember from the interview:

- How did you meet?

- What is your birthday? And what is your wife's? (my husband almost got my bday wrong!!! because mine and his mothers are very close so he almost said his mom's bday but he corrected it immediately)

-When did you get married?

- When did you move to this apartment? How much is the rent? Where did you live before? and before that? (She took our joint apartment leases of all the apartments we lived at)

- Have you met your wife's family?

- Who cooks at home?

- Do you want kids? and why not?

- Do you have joint bank accounts? (No. because we both work and it's easier for us to keep accounts separate. I explained to her that we use Chase quickpay to transfer money to each other for utilities, rent, eating out. etc. but she wasn't interested in seeing the payment statements I brought)

- Do you have joint health insurance? (No. I get my insurance from grad school and my husband has no insurance)

- Does your husband have any sibling?

- Who lives in the apartment? (My husband said me my wife and our car mr. jiggles and she started laughing and said oh you are funny)

- What else did you bring that can prove that you are a couple?

The rest is just chit chat. She went through our photo album that had 80+ photos including vacations, friends and family pics, holiday pics, bday pics, party pics, graduation pics and she made comments on many of them. She ended up taking 4 or 5 for her file. We brought a lot of documents but she was only interested in the ones that had both of our names on it. She even used a highlighter to highlight our joint information on them. She didn't want to see any of the concert tickets or gift receipts that we brought. She ended up taking for her file our apt leases, most recent joint tax return, our cat's adoption documents, and our joint car insurance paper.

I think the whole interview lasted about 15-20 mins. She said she would review and let us know a decision by mail in 4-6 weeks. I was a little disappointed that we didn't get approved on the spot but we were confident that we would get approved. An hour later I got case update that it's been approved and new card has been ordered.

I wanted to point out couple things that I had questions about through out the AOS process and hopefully this can be helpful to someone:

1. We did not have joint bank accounts or credit cards. A lot of people say it's important, but it seems like if you have plenty of other evidence showing co-mingle of finance and just life in general, you should be fine.

2. My husband was charged with an Adam Walsh Act offense. Due to some crazy ex-gf drama he was charged with a felony sexual offense that he didn't deserve but could fall under AWA. That charge was eventually amended to a misdemeanor non-sexual offense and that was what he was convicted of. I was very worried about this at the beginning of our AOS process that he might get additional background check and may be found ineligible to sponsor. After consulting with a very experienced attorney we decided to not disclose it in our application. It was never brought up during the whole process and did not cause any issue. I remember someone on this forum had similar question so just wanted to put this out there for any future reference.

3. My husband's income was just a little over the poverty requirement when we filed. We used his current income that consisted of 6 months worth of paychecks and a letter from his employer stating his position, hours and wage. We never got an RFE. He later lost his job and his current income did not meet the requirement anymore. I brought an updated i864 to the interview that included my income which significantly exceeds the requirement, and our most recent 4 paychecks. However the IO didn't ask for it. I think that we might just have got lucky. I would still suggest being prepared for an updated i864 if your sponsor has changed jobs.

I'm glad this is over for now as we waited for 13 months already. Best of luck everyone on your immigration and life journeys!

Edited December 10, 2016 by Katherine93

[freshgreengrass 12]

Thank you for sharing your story, really awesome post. Congratulations!

[Catuela 16]

Congrats

[Dutchster 1,106]

Good to hear about the health insurance too! My husband and I pay so much for the two of us and since I'm going to work at the same company, I'm getting my own. Much cheaper! But I'm slightly worried they'll ask questions why we don't share. Thanks for sharing and congrats!

[Katherine93 30]

Thank you for sharing your story, really awesome post. Congratulations!

Congrats

Thank you!

Good to hear about the health insurance too! My husband and I pay so much for the two of us and since I'm going to work at the same company, I'm getting my own. Much cheaper! But I'm slightly worried they'll ask questions why we don't share. Thanks for sharing and congrats!

You are welcome I wouldn't sweat it. If they do ask you at the interview I'd just tell them the honest reason. They are not going to determine whether your marriage is legitimate solely based on whether or not you have health insurance together. They'll take everything into consideration so if you have lots of other evidence you'll be just fine!

[TBoneTX 43,058]

*** Thread is moved from the "AOS from WS&T Visas" main forum to the Case Progress subforum. ***

[Beth & Achraf 328]

We had our AOS interview on Thursday 12/8 and was approved for green card. I have received a lot of help from this forum so I wanted to share my own experience that may be helpful to anyone in the future.

My specific timeline is in my signature. Long story short that my husband (USC) and I (adjusted from F1 visa) have been married for 1 year and 9 months and been together for over 3 years. We are located in Houston, TX. We are about the same age 22/23

Our interview appointment was at 12:45 pm, we arrived 10 mins before as my husband could not get off until noon. We went through security and everyone was asked to power off all electronic devices and put them away. We sat in the lobby with about 40 other couples and waited for over 1.5 hours before my name was called...then the IO who was a mid-aged hispanic looking lady took us to her office. She had a thick stack of file that included everything that we already submitted. She took our DLs, my passport and my husband's birth certificate. I had to explain to her why my husband didn't change his address on his DL after we moved (it's our old apt address on his), but she didn't seem to care. She also took my new i693 envelope as my old medical expired after 1 year. She then started by verifying the information on the i130 and i485 forms and put check marks on there as we answered. She asked my husband most of the questions...I was kinda worried about that as my husband is very careless and extremely forgetful. I was afraid that he was gonna mess up a date or something lol Below are some questions that I remember from the interview:

- How did you meet?

- What is your birthday? And what is your wife's? (my husband almost got my bday wrong!!! because mine and his mothers are very close so he almost said his mom's bday but he corrected it immediately)

-When did you get married?

- When did you move to this apartment? How much is the rent? Where did you live before? and before that? (She took our joint apartment leases of all the apartments we lived at)

- Have you met your wife's family?

- Who cooks at home?

- Do you want kids? and why not?

- Do you have joint bank accounts? (No. because we both work and it's easier for us to keep accounts separate. I explained to her that we use Chase quickpay to transfer money to each other for utilities, rent, eating out. etc. but she wasn't interested in seeing the payment statements I brought)

- Do you have joint health insurance? (No. I get my insurance from grad school and my husband has no insurance)

- Does your husband have any sibling?

- Who lives in the apartment? (My husband said me my wife and our car mr. jiggles and she started laughing and said oh you are funny)

- What else did you bring that can prove that you are a couple?

The rest is just chit chat. She went through our photo album that had 80+ photos including vacations, friends and family pics, holiday pics, bday pics, party pics, graduation pics and she made comments on many of them. She ended up taking 4 or 5 for her file. We brought a lot of documents but she was only interested in the ones that had both of our names on it. She even used a highlighter to highlight our joint information on them. She didn't want to see any of the concert tickets or gift receipts that we brought. She ended up taking for her file our apt leases, most recent joint tax return, our cat's adoption documents, and our joint car insurance paper.

I think the whole interview lasted about 15-20 mins. She said she would review and let us know a decision by mail in 4-6 weeks. I was a little disappointed that we didn't get approved on the spot but we were confident that we would get approved. An hour later I got case update that it's been approved and new card has been ordered.

I wanted to point out couple things that I had questions about through out the AOS process and hopefully this can be helpful to someone:

1. We did not have joint bank accounts or credit cards. A lot of people say it's important, but it seems like if you have plenty of other evidence showing co-mingle of finance and just life in general, you should be fine.

2. My husband was charged with an Adam Walsh Act offense. Due to some crazy ex-gf drama he was charged with a felony sexual offense that he didn't deserve but could fall under AWA. That charge was eventually amended to a misdemeanor non-sexual offense and that was what he was convicted of. I was very worried about this at the beginning of our AOS process that he might get additional background check and may be found ineligible to sponsor. After consulting with a very experienced attorney we decided to not disclose it in our application. It was never brought up during the whole process and did not cause any issue. I remember someone on this forum had similar question so just wanted to put this out there for any future reference.

3. My husband's income was just a little over the poverty requirement when we filed. We used his current income that consisted of 6 months worth of paychecks and a letter from his employer stating his position, hours and wage. We never got an RFE. He later lost his job and his current income did not meet the requirement anymore. I brought an updated i864 to the interview that included my income which significantly exceeds the requirement, and our most recent 4 paychecks. However the IO didn't ask for it. I think that we might just have got lucky. I would still suggest being prepared for an updated i864 if your sponsor has changed jobs.

I'm glad this is over for now as we waited for 13 months already. Best of luck everyone on your immigration and life journeys!

Thank you for posting this, our interview sometime in 2017 will be Houston office.

Did they ask you for any documents?, or further proof of an on going marriage since after you originally filed? Want to be really prepared for this.

Congrats on your approval.

[Katherine93 30]

Thank you for posting this, our interview sometime in 2017 will be Houston office.

Did they ask you for any documents?, or further proof of an on going marriage since after you originally filed? Want to be really prepared for this.

Congrats on your approval.

She only asked for our new apt lease since we had moved this year, and the new medical since the old one expired after one year. She then asked if we had anything else that we wanted to submit that could prove that we are a couple, so we gave her our 2015 joint tax return, our cat's adoption document, flight & hotel reservations for the trips that we took since the time that we filed, and our joint car insurance documents. We front loaded our application package so there was not much that she specifically wanted. We didn't apply for AOS until about 9 months after we get married, so we did already submit a lot of evidence in the original package. We actually brought EVERYTHING that we had submitted PLUS the new evidence, but she was only interested in seeing the new ones. So I would focus on the new material, although it wouldn't hurt to have everything just in case.

[blessedbeyond 38]

We had our AOS interview on Thursday 12/8 and was approved for green card. I have received a lot of help from this forum so I wanted to share my own experience that may be helpful to anyone in the future.

My specific timeline is in my signature. Long story short that my husband (USC) and I (adjusted from F1 visa) have been married for 1 year and 9 months and been together for over 3 years. We are located in Houston, TX. We are about the same age 22/23

Our interview appointment was at 12:45 pm, we arrived 10 mins before as my husband could not get off until noon. We went through security and everyone was asked to power off all electronic devices and put them away. We sat in the lobby with about 40 other couples and waited for over 1.5 hours before my name was called...then the IO who was a mid-aged hispanic looking lady took us to her office. She had a thick stack of file that included everything that we already submitted. She took our DLs, my passport and my husband's birth certificate. I had to explain to her why my husband didn't change his address on his DL after we moved (it's our old apt address on his), but she didn't seem to care. She also took my new i693 envelope as my old medical expired after 1 year. She then started by verifying the information on the i130 and i485 forms and put check marks on there as we answered. She asked my husband most of the questions...I was kinda worried about that as my husband is very careless and extremely forgetful. I was afraid that he was gonna mess up a date or something lol Below are some questions that I remember from the interview:

- How did you meet?

- What is your birthday? And what is your wife's? (my husband almost got my bday wrong!!! because mine and his mothers are very close so he almost said his mom's bday but he corrected it immediately)

-When did you get married?

- When did you move to this apartment? How much is the rent? Where did you live before? and before that? (She took our joint apartment leases of all the apartments we lived at)

- Have you met your wife's family?

- Who cooks at home?

- Do you want kids? and why not?

- Do you have joint bank accounts? (No. because we both work and it's easier for us to keep accounts separate. I explained to her that we use Chase quickpay to transfer money to each other for utilities, rent, eating out. etc. but she wasn't interested in seeing the payment statements I brought)

- Do you have joint health insurance? (No. I get my insurance from grad school and my husband has no insurance)

- Does your husband have any sibling?

- Who lives in the apartment? (My husband said me my wife and our car mr. jiggles and she started laughing and said oh you are funny)

- What else did you bring that can prove that you are a couple?

The rest is just chit chat. She went through our photo album that had 80+ photos including vacations, friends and family pics, holiday pics, bday pics, party pics, graduation pics and she made comments on many of them. She ended up taking 4 or 5 for her file. We brought a lot of documents but she was only interested in the ones that had both of our names on it. She even used a highlighter to highlight our joint information on them. She didn't want to see any of the concert tickets or gift receipts that we brought. She ended up taking for her file our apt leases, most recent joint tax return, our cat's adoption documents, and our joint car insurance paper.

I think the whole interview lasted about 15-20 mins. She said she would review and let us know a decision by mail in 4-6 weeks. I was a little disappointed that we didn't get approved on the spot but we were confident that we would get approved. An hour later I got case update that it's been approved and new card has been ordered.

I wanted to point out couple things that I had questions about through out the AOS process and hopefully this can be helpful to someone:

1. We did not have joint bank accounts or credit cards. A lot of people say it's important, but it seems like if you have plenty of other evidence showing co-mingle of finance and just life in general, you should be fine.

2. My husband was charged with an Adam Walsh Act offense. Due to some crazy ex-gf drama he was charged with a felony sexual offense that he didn't deserve but could fall under AWA. That charge was eventually amended to a misdemeanor non-sexual offense and that was what he was convicted of. I was very worried about this at the beginning of our AOS process that he might get additional background check and may be found ineligible to sponsor. After consulting with a very experienced attorney we decided to not disclose it in our application. It was never brought up during the whole process and did not cause any issue. I remember someone on this forum had similar question so just wanted to put this out there for any future reference.

3. My husband's income was just a little over the poverty requirement when we filed. We used his current income that consisted of 6 months worth of paychecks and a letter from his employer stating his position, hours and wage. We never got an RFE. He later lost his job and his current income did not meet the requirement anymore. I brought an updated i864 to the interview that included my income which significantly exceeds the requirement, and our most recent 4 paychecks. However the IO didn't ask for it. I think that we might just have got lucky. I would still suggest being prepared for an updated i864 if your sponsor has changed jobs.

I'm glad this is over for now as we waited for 13 months already. Best of luck everyone on your immigration and life journeys!

Congratulations! We have the same PD, same interview date and we were both approved on the spot @ Houston USCIS Field Office Best of luck in the future, x.

[Katherine93 30]

Congratulations! We have the same PD, same interview date and we were both approved on the spot @ Houston USCIS Field Office Best of luck in the future, x.

Right I remember haha! We are on the same timeline Congrats to you too!!