Receiving the official Receipt Notice (Form I-797) with your Receipt Number

[EhsanHatem 0]

Hey all,

My husband and I are currently residing in Egypt. We just started our papers for my husband to move back with me to the US. Since we're both living in Egypt we wrote our Egyptian address on our I-130 form which we sent on the 1st of September. On the 7th of September we recieved an email confirming the acceptance of our case as stated below:

'Your case has been accepted and routed to the USCIS California Service Center for processing. Within 7-10 days by standard mail you will receive your official Receipt Notice (Form I-797) with your Receipt Number.'

We waited about 20 days for the form/papers but nothing came. Yesterday we called USCIS to inquire about the status and to see whether or not the form was sent to us. We used our recipt number to access our case information that was sent to us in the email. We were told by the rep. that the reason we never recieved the form was because my (petitioner) address is outside the US (forign)and that we need to change it to an address within the US. He asked us to send a letter (by mail) to the Service Center handling our case but with further research we found a rep who helped us make the address change by phone.

We have a few questions:

1- Is it true that they do not send anything outside the US? If so, then what are the US citizens residing abroad supposed to do?!?

2- Is the form I-797 important for getting to the next step? One rep said that we just have to sit back and wait, and that if we need to send anything we can print a copy of the email we recieved and attach it as proof instead of the I-797 form. Is this true?

3- How long are we supposed to wait to see a change in our case status -whether it's been approved or denied? And is there anything we can/should be doing now?

4-Has this happened to anyone else? Should we be worried or is this normal?

Thanks for your time, any info or help will be greatly appreciated. We REALLY wanna get out of this country

Sincerely,

Sunny & Maz

Edited September 28, 2012 by EhsanHatem

[reese1 68]

#1- Yes this is true, you have to have an address in the US for this stage.

#2- Not sure, however it does state the same information so you maybe able to do that. And until the AOS I don't think you need this for the interview.

#3- Depending on if you were sent to CSC or VSC the wait can be from 3 to 8 months could be shorter could be longer than this.

#4- Sounds like everything is fine so far, what ever address you had it sent to in the US you can always have them scan/email you the letters that are sent.

Best of luck to you both!

Edited September 28, 2012 by reese1

[Cathi 5,886]

#1- Yes this is true, you have to have an address in the US for this stage.

#2- Not sure, however it does state the same information so you maybe able to do that. And until the AOS I don't think you need this for the interview.

#3- Depending on if you were sent to CSC or VSC the wait can be from 3 to 8 months could be shorter could be longer than this.

#4- Sounds like everything is fine so far, what ever address you had it sent to in the US you can always have them scan/email you the letters that are sent.

Best of luck to you both!

The answer to number one is not true, You do not need an address in the US until you have to file the affidavit of support to prove to the USCIS that you have an address in the US to move to as you must have a domicile in the US for the non US citizen to move to. People file outside the country every day. You do not need the NO1 receipt for anything as long as you have the email confirmation with the information on it. Current processing times at the USCIS are approximately 5 months.

[Nick1980 11]

Hey all,

My husband and I are currently residing in Egypt. We just started our papers for my husband to move back with me to the US. Since we're both living in Egypt we wrote our Egyptian address on our I-130 form which we sent on the 1st of September. On the 7th of September we recieved an email confirming the acceptance of our case as stated below:

'Your case has been accepted and routed to the USCIS California Service Center for processing. Within 7-10 days by standard mail you will receive your official Receipt Notice (Form I-797) with your Receipt Number.'

We waited about 20 days for the form/papers but nothing came. Yesterday we called USCIS to inquire about the status and to see whether or not the form was sent to us. We used our recipt number to access our case information that was sent to us in the email. We were told by the rep. that the reason we never recieved the form was because my (petitioner) address is outside the US (forign)and that we need to change it to an address within the US. He asked us to send a letter (by mail) to the Service Center handling our case but with further research we found a rep who helped us make the address change by phone.

We have a few questions:

1- Is it true that they do not send anything outside the US? If so, then what are the US citizens residing abroad supposed to do?!?

2- Is the form I-797 important for getting to the next step? One rep said that we just have to sit back and wait, and that if we need to send anything we can print a copy of the email we recieved and attach it as proof instead of the I-797 form. Is this true?

3- How long are we supposed to wait to see a change in our case status -whether it's been approved or denied? And is there anything we can/should be doing now?

4-Has this happened to anyone else? Should we be worried or is this normal?

Thanks for your time, any info or help will be greatly appreciated. We REALLY wanna get out of this country

Sincerely,

Sunny & Maz

1- It is not true that they don't send anything outside of US.I am speaking from personal experience.We recently filed I130 form with Chicago on the 19th was recieved and on the 21st we got the same e-mail you did.On the 26th or 27th we got NOA1 (I797) we got it by regular mail.We also used our outside of US address for everything

2-I dont't think that you will need it later for anything other that checking your status which you can do also from e-mail

3-Any change in your status (as of recently it's happening that after a week or so your status is updated to 'being transfered to another office because of jurisdiction' but this might not happen to you

[dwheels76 5,487]

Since you are a US citizen living abroad you will probably get auto-expedited. Your adjudication time could be cut considerably shorter. Most I have seen go throuigh USCIS in less than 3 months. However not a guarantee.

[BoogyPup 1]

Hey all,

My husband and I are currently residing in Egypt. We just started our papers for my husband to move back with me to the US. Since we're both living in Egypt we wrote our Egyptian address on our I-130 form which we sent on the 1st of September. On the 7th of September we recieved an email confirming the acceptance of our case as stated below:

'Your case has been accepted and routed to the USCIS California Service Center for processing. Within 7-10 days by standard mail you will receive your official Receipt Notice (Form I-797) with your Receipt Number.'

We waited about 20 days for the form/papers but nothing came. Yesterday we called USCIS to inquire about the status and to see whether or not the form was sent to us. We used our recipt number to access our case information that was sent to us in the email. We were told by the rep. that the reason we never recieved the form was because my (petitioner) address is outside the US (forign)and that we need to change it to an address within the US. He asked us to send a letter (by mail) to the Service Center handling our case but with further research we found a rep who helped us make the address change by phone.

We have a few questions:

1- Is it true that they do not send anything outside the US? If so, then what are the US citizens residing abroad supposed to do?!?

2- Is the form I-797 important for getting to the next step? One rep said that we just have to sit back and wait, and that if we need to send anything we can print a copy of the email we recieved and attach it as proof instead of the I-797 form. Is this true?

3- How long are we supposed to wait to see a change in our case status -whether it's been approved or denied? And is there anything we can/should be doing now?

4-Has this happened to anyone else? Should we be worried or is this normal?

Thanks for your time, any info or help will be greatly appreciated. We REALLY wanna get out of this country

Sincerely,

Sunny & Maz

No you don not necessarily have to have a US address...Its just that overseas mails gets delayed quite often...we sent our petition from Fiji and it took a month for us to get our receipt (hardcopy) you have email confirmation which is fine at this stage.....keep checking ur case status online u might get approved earlier as it was applied from overseas...ours got approved in 35 days......

[together4evr 360]

Now that she added a us address she might not get auto expedited.