Rescheduling N400 interview (by e-mail!)

[sashitaski 3]

I just wanted to give a brief description of our recent experience rescheduling the N400 interview, in case it is helpful to someone else. There are many horror stories on Visajourney of people's applications getting lost, of the processing dragging on forever, etc. Some people also advise never to ask the USCIS to move the date unless you have an emergency such as a death in the family. I have to admit these stories scared us, and we thought long and hard about whether we should attempt to have the date moved. However, because we had a long-planned vacation scheduled for the week of my husband's interview, we decided to try our luck at getting his appointment rescheduled. While I know that many people have had bad experiences in the past, I am happy to report that for us it was a fast, easy, efficient process. Please note that our local office is in Washington, D.C., and things may be different at other offices. On the other hand, according to Visajourney and USCIS statistics, Washington, D.C. has one of the longest processing times for the N400 journey, so I'm not quite sure what to make of that.

Here is what we did:

8/25: received notice that an interview had been scheduled for 9/27

8/26: sent an e-mail to was.interviewreschedule@dhs.gov, an e-mail account that exists just for the purpose of rescheduling interviews in our area. Note that they do NOT tell you in your interview letter that you can send a rescheduling request by e-mail; they say that you need to send the original letter along with an explanation note by snail mail. I found the e-mail address here: https://egov.uscis.gov/crisgwi/go?action=offices.detail&office=WAS&OfficeLocator.office_type=LO&OfficeLocator.statecode=DC

8/27: sent the original interview letter and explanatory note to them by snail mail, since we wanted to make sure we had all our bases covered.

8/27: received e-mail confirmation that our request to cancel the 9/27 interview had been received. The confirmation came less than 24 hours after sending the request!

8/29: received the same cancellation confirmation by snail mail

9/4: received a new interview date of October 5 - only one week later than the originally scheduled interview!

As you can see, the whole process took just over one week, and the interview was also delayed one week only.

I believe the key to this was the fact that we submitted a request by e-mail. If your local office offers the option to send a reschedule request by e-mail, I would highly recommend you try it!

That said, I would not recommend trying to have your interview rescheduled if the original date is only slightly inconvenient for you. I would always try to rearrange my own schedule before asking the USCIS to rearrange theirs, because you never know with the USCIS (what if your application does get lost and the process is delayed for months?). I also read somewhere that it may be very difficult to have an interview rescheduled a second time, so you should try to avoid that at all costs.

Good luck on your own visajourney!

[TBoneTX 43,058]

Thanks for posting this interesting, enlightening information, si man.

[Coho 1]

8/25: received notice that an interview had been scheduled for 9/27

8/26: sent an e-mail to was.interviewreschedule@dhs.gov, an e-mail account that exists just for the purpose of rescheduling interviews in our area. Note that they do NOT tell you in your interview letter that you can send a rescheduling request by e-mail; they say that you need to send the original letter along with an explanation note by snail mail. I found the e-mail address here: https://egov.uscis.g...or.statecode=DC

8/27: sent the original interview letter and explanatory note to them by snail mail, since we wanted to make sure we had all our bases covered.

8/27: received e-mail confirmation that our request to cancel the 9/27 interview had been received. The confirmation came less than 24 hours after sending the request!

8/29: received the same cancellation confirmation by snail mail

9/4: received a new interview date of October 5 - only one week later than the originally scheduled interview!

Hi sashitaski,

Very encouraging info for anyone who may require at some stage.

By the by can you give the correct URL where one can find the E mail address.

I mean the correct E mail address of various district offices where the interviews would be held.

Thanks

[Barca 10]

Thanks for sharing!

[R & M 14]

Thank you very much. Followed the steps indicated and received a response in a couple of hours after I sent the re-schedule request to the Washington, DC Office. Very helpful post. Thanks again.

[Salvaje 5]

On 11/30/2017 at 10:33 AM, R & M said:

Thank you very much. Followed the steps indicated and received a response in a couple of hours after I sent the re-schedule request to the Washington, DC Office. Very helpful post. Thanks again.

I cannot find the email address for my field office.

[GoBig 25]

this post has been over 5 years old!

[VisaV 7]

Guessing this doesn't work any more as I got no response after almost a week of sending the email.