Newbie here - Help please!

[Saffyre 0]

Hi everyone. I've been scouring this site as a fabulous source of information over the past few days and I thought it about time I joined in.

I met my US fiance in February 2005, in person while he was working in England for a while, when he went back to the US in July 2005 we stayed in touch by phone and email, but didn't see each other in person again until April 2007. He was in the UK until September 2007 and we spend almost every weekend together. We decided that we didn't want to be apart and that we would figure out a way to make our relationship work. I flew over to Florida to see him at Xmas, and he proposed to me....

We are now filing the I-129F, and honestly it's a nightmare. I'm helping him just as much as I can because I know how he hates paperwork, but i'm getting so tangled up in a couple of things.

1. Passport photo. UK standard size is 1.8" x 1.4" instead of the US standard 2"x2" - how much of a problem will this cause me?

2. Proof of having met. We have the stamps from his passport over the past couple of years, and the stamp in my passport at Xmas along with a copy of the E-ticket I purchased for my flight. We have multiple photographs, dating back to 2005. I have one of my boarding cards from my trip, but I lost the other. IS this enough?

3. Proof of ongoing relationship. I have my E-ticket for my next trip at the end of February, and I have all of the above. How much information do I need to give at this point? I was never really one for hoarding emails. I may have a couple but they're not anything of a "I love you, I must have you right now" nature. They're just general stuff. Oh and call records, for me to call the US, I dial an access number which lets me call at 1p a minute - so this means the access number shows on my bill, and not his number. If I provide proof that the access number dials the US, will this be ok?

This whole thing is getting me so tied in knots.

Please help me!

[Jeraly 3]

1. Passport photo. UK standard size is 1.8" x 1.4" instead of the US standard 2"x2" - how much of a problem will this cause me? I know plenty of people who have had no problems with the UK standard, myself included, but we knew no better at the time! It's prolly best to play it safe and get the US ones if you can

2. Proof of having met. We have the stamps from his passport over the past couple of years, and the stamp in my passport at Xmas along with a copy of the E-ticket I purchased for my flight. We have multiple photographs, dating back to 2005. I have one of my boarding cards from my trip, but I lost the other. IS this enough?It sounds ok - we sent a whole bunch of stuff so it is prolly better to include all you have - better too much than not enough IMHO. Remember to make a copy of everything and send the copies - keep an identical package with all the originals in for your reference or for if things get lost Another thing we didn't do

3. Proof of ongoing relationship. I have my E-ticket for my next trip at the end of February, and I have all of the above. How much information do I need to give at this point? I was never really one for hoarding emails. I may have a couple but they're not anything of a "I love you, I must have you right now" nature. They're just general stuff. Oh and call records, for me to call the US, I dial an access number which lets me call at 1p a minute - so this means the access number shows on my bill, and not his number. If I provide proof that the access number dials the US, will this be ok? This only needs to be covered at interview to show you have been maintaining a relationship while the application was getting processed. Of course we sent everything so... We sent e-mails, screen prints of conversations on instant messenger etc. We'll prolly use the same sort of thing when I go to interview - online conversations, phone bills, photos etc etc

Good luck!!!

[Saffyre 0]

1. Passport photo. UK standard size is 1.8" x 1.4" instead of the US standard 2"x2" - how much of a problem will this cause me? I know plenty of people who have had no problems with the UK standard, myself included, but we knew no better at the time! It's prolly best to play it safe and get the US ones if you can

2. Proof of having met. We have the stamps from his passport over the past couple of years, and the stamp in my passport at Xmas along with a copy of the E-ticket I purchased for my flight. We have multiple photographs, dating back to 2005. I have one of my boarding cards from my trip, but I lost the other. IS this enough?It sounds ok - we sent a whole bunch of stuff so it is prolly better to include all you have - better too much than not enough IMHO. Remember to make a copy of everything and send the copies - keep an identical package with all the originals in for your reference or for if things get lost Another thing we didn't do

3. Proof of ongoing relationship. I have my E-ticket for my next trip at the end of February, and I have all of the above. How much information do I need to give at this point? I was never really one for hoarding emails. I may have a couple but they're not anything of a "I love you, I must have you right now" nature. They're just general stuff. Oh and call records, for me to call the US, I dial an access number which lets me call at 1p a minute - so this means the access number shows on my bill, and not his number. If I provide proof that the access number dials the US, will this be ok? This only needs to be covered at interview to show you have been maintaining a relationship while the application was getting processed. Of course we sent everything so... We sent e-mails, screen prints of conversations on instant messenger etc. We'll prolly use the same sort of thing when I go to interview - online conversations, phone bills, photos etc etc

Good luck!!!

Thanks so much for your help and advice. This site is an awsome source of information and support. I have been going mad trying to think of all the things we could or should get.

Have you already completed the process or are you still going through it? If you're complete, how long did it take from start to finish? I'm thinking at VSC it's going to be about 120 days to get MOA2, would this be about right?

[Jeraly 3]

I'm still going through - I'm a July filer so got caught in all that backup - it took me 5 months to get my NOA2 and I think my case is now at the embassy (took a month for CSC to send it to NVC).

Seriously don't make any wedding plans until you get the visa or at the very worst have an interview date!! We have had so much hassle trying to backup and make plans because we didn't know any better - if only we had found this place before!!

VSC is MUCH faster at the moment so 120 may be about right - might be a little longer/shorter but it's a good estimate

[kgas 0]

Good luck, Saffyre!

It took me 104 days from NOA1 to NOA2 at VSC after filing in October, so things are definitely picking up. I think we'll probably get our interview in March if timelines are any indication, but in any case, he can't come here till mid-May as we're getting married in mid-August (unless we cheat and do a City Hall marriage before the church one!).

Passport photo: We sent one of mine (American) and one of his (British) and I didn't even notice the differences. They didn't either as we didn't receive any RFEs about it. I would imagine you wouldn't have a problem if you used British ones.

Proof of having met: I included five photos at us together at different locations (one at my graduation with my parents) and I considered ones where we did weird poses and faces together so it would be extremely difficult to Photoshop... (I know, #######). I included my passport stamps to England and email itineraries from all of our trips back and forth from the US to UK. If you have any kind of itineraries or receipts that were emailed to you, that should be fine. We didn't have any boarding passes or anything like that.

Proof of ongoing relationship: Like Jeraly said, this is more for the interview stage, but I did include a copy of his upcoming itinerary to America in November and a contract and cancelled check for our wedding reception venue. I think it did help move ours along.

The biggest tip I can give you at this point is to triple and quadruple check your I-129F for missing information (it's easy to skip some of those blanks) and make sure you write "NONE" in the necessary blanks instead of "N/A." Getting an RFE for a tiny oversight like that is heartbreaking and can add a month or more to the process.

The paperwork seems daunting at first, but it'll definitely be worth it!