Fed up with TSC

[Nakai & Vic 15]

So I called TSC today which is my first call in months, and the lady tells me at least another 2 months to hear anything about our case, well I filed June 30th 2014 and got my NOA1 first week of July 2014. I ask her to transfer me to a Tier 2 and she ask me what did I need to ask them? I said I want to be transfferd to a tier 2 please to ask what is going on with my case. She proceeds to tell me that they will only give me the same information that she gave me, I said fine let them give me that please transfer me. What the heck is going on, now they are the gate keepers??????

I get that this is a long process but can you be honest with me about it don't piss on me and tell me its raining!!!! She says that TSC is a little behind and that they are just processing apps from May 6th what the hell correct me if I'm wrong weren't they doing those back in October 2014? All I am saying is this give people straight answers! i am contacting my State Rep in the morning, this is ridiculous!

[Chalandrae 29]

My NOA1 is July 29. Fiancé called today and was told they are backlogged 84 days, which means they are still processing some applications from May. He tried to put an inquiry for us, but because of that specific reason, it wouldn't go through.

He was told to call at the end of January and then they would try again.

[Pitaya 2,576]

~Moved from K1 Process to K1 Progress Forum~

~Commentary about case status~

[Frewchen 8]

Agree! Got my NOA1 June 27, 2014 and still no response. What's the best thing to do (except wait)?

[cdneh 3,112]

Wait is all you can do. Your state rep cannot find out anymore for you than you can do for yourselves.

[HafsaJawwad 39]

If you want to call back and keep trying your luck that you'll get someone who actually can make an effort. I was calling a few weeks back and waited over an hour just to have the lady say they are processing May 6. Which was just what she read on the website. She literally did nothing at all to try and help me. I would suggest going to your local field office if you are able to. I've heard a lot of people say that they at least received information about their case and where it is in the processing stage.

On another note, I believe they are processing end of June now. So hopefully you will get good news very soon! I know the wait is painful and stressful but hang in there and stay positive! It'll all be worth it

[samkoll247 0]

The only advice I have for you is to get your congressman involve coz I did the same thing and it work out fine for me. Congressman has direct contact with the supervisor in charge you case.

Goodluck

[mymercy 85]

You are so so right cos I am in the same category. My NOA 1 was received on July 18 and nothing yet.

My concern is that its like this mess is peculiar to the Nigeria fillers in TSC because going by time-lines, it appears they are giving some countries much reference than the others such as Philipines, etc.

This waiting is so so crazy and pissing me off.. A lot of stuffs my fiancée needs to do but put all in halt cos of this process so that he doesn't start and couldn't finish up when d whole thing ready.

Cant TSC just give a definite date the case would be completed and stop putting people on unnecessary suspense.

[LexxBec 0]

Yeah it's a huge problem. My wife is worried sick and moody and she just wishes USCIS just get their acts together. I also believe that some other countries are given preference over others and Nigeria probably is in the overlooked category. I've had to put off so many projects because I don't want to start them and not finish and so far it seems like I've lost opportunities to advance myself. WE just have to keep on waiting in the hope that the wait will be over soon. I've come across a USCIS SOP concerning how they respond to filings and it's not an easy job but still....

[foreignnaijawife 17]

We filed June 2013 and we had several delays, DACA, DOMA, govt shutdown, Typhoon in the Philippines that expedited all Philippine cases, NVC extended their wait times. No RFEs at all. By God's grace my husband will be home next month.

Edited January 10, 2015 by foreignnaijawife

[stef_curls 42]

Hey everyone... I feel your pain with being frustrated with TSC. Let me tell you-- I've contacted one of my State Senator's and reps and am now working with them to get answers from USCIS. That is what these people are there for, to help. If you haven't yet I highly suggest getting in contact with them! It's a fairly easy google search to find who yours are, and then their websites. A lot of them have everything online now.

Here is an example/blank letter to base yours off of... just tweak it to fit your story.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_6zX0T7LHrJA7dWgiwbmyxtOAe7YksWXTc0Bnpp8mTs/edit?usp=sharing

Look for a privacy release form on your rep's website and send that in too if they have one. Even if nothing comes from this, all the noise we are making might be enough to do SOMETHING. The more of us making noise, the more likely we are to be heard. Good luck everyone, and let us know how it goes if you do write.

[av8or1 246]

Good advice stef. I think if more folk wrote their reps and made enough noise then maybe something might happen. Feel free to mention the effort my local rep is making too. If we could get more reps on board with that, then who knows, maybe another batch of petitions could be transferred to the CSC.

That said, after learning what I did WRT the delay at the TSC, I must admit to being less annoyed with them in particular. It sounds to me like the TSC is doing the best the can with a horrible situation. My frustration has shifted to the USCIS as a whole for not adjusting their strategy once the TSC was hit with this large influx of work-visa-to-AOS petitions. Perhaps the TSC hasn't complained enough about that, who knows. Regardless something needs to be done about the time difference, something needs to be done to help the TSC with their workload, which is why I'm satisfied with the approach that my rep is taking to attempt to solve the problem. For all of us.

And having said that, the larger issue that I find frustrating (and for which there is no immediate or even short term answer) is how our petitions receive such low priority in the first place. I mean heck, that's the reason the TSC is so far behind with the I-129Fs in the first place: they receive lower priority than other petitions. WHY is that??!??! A friend of a friend is an immigration attorney; I spoke with him offline about it all. Being in the "business" for lots of years, I felt that he might have something valuable to impart. He told me outright that the USCIS "...is in no rush whatsoever to process your petition." In his experience the I-129F is in the lower rung of the petition priority ladder. And yet such petitions are submitted by USCs. So what the heck? The only thing I can even attempt to come up with is the cost. AOS petitions are 3, almost 4 times more expensive, so maybe that's it. Or a part of it. But it seems illogical to me somehow. Improbable, unlikely. I dunno. Doesn't make sense to me....

And even having said all of that, the CSC is doing quite well with the processing of their I-129Fs. At least at the moment. Sure, it changes over time, but the system as a whole is broken. As has been said a zillion times before, I realize.

Ok enough ramblings. Maybe the transfer thing will happen, we'll see.

[stef_curls 42]

Good advice stef. I think if more folk wrote their reps and made enough noise then maybe something might happen. Feel free to mention the effort my local rep is making too. If we could get more reps on board with that, then who knows, maybe another batch of petitions could be transferred to the CSC.

That said, after learning what I did WRT the delay at the TSC, I must admit to being less annoyed with them in particular. It sounds to me like the TSC is doing the best the can with a horrible situation. My frustration has shifted to the USCIS as a whole for not adjusting their strategy once the TSC was hit with this large influx of work-visa-to-AOS petitions. Perhaps the TSC hasn't complained enough about that, who knows. Regardless something needs to be done about the time difference, something needs to be done to help the TSC with their workload, which is why I'm satisfied with the approach that my rep is taking to attempt to solve the problem. For all of us.

And having said that, the larger issue that I find frustrating (and for which there is no immediate or even short term answer) is how our petitions receive such low priority in the first place. I mean heck, that's the reason the TSC is so far behind with the I-129Fs in the first place: they receive lower priority than other petitions. WHY is that??!??! A friend of a friend is an immigration attorney; I spoke with him offline about it all. Being in the "business" for lots of years, I felt that he might have something valuable to impart. He told me outright that the USCIS "...is in no rush whatsoever to process your petition." In his experience the I-129F is in the lower rung of the petition priority ladder. And yet such petitions are submitted by USCs. So what the heck? The only thing I can even attempt to come up with is the cost. AOS petitions are 3, almost 4 times more expensive, so maybe that's it. Or a part of it. But it seems illogical to me somehow. Improbable, unlikely. I dunno. Doesn't make sense to me....

And even having said all of that, the CSC is doing quite well with the processing of their I-129Fs. At least at the moment. Sure, it changes over time, but the system as a whole is broken. As has been said a zillion times before, I realize.

Ok enough ramblings. Maybe the transfer thing will happen, we'll see.

So I actually had used a quote from your recent update from Carter in a post I wrote for reddit. Here is the google doc:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/11Q5SZQL7Lg72JESW6bgdEmq6B4aJOwdK1qGlXx_STKA/edit?usp=sharing

I found your post enlightening and relieving, that they finally admitted how behind they were. That straight out lying stuff was BS.

and here are the two places on reddit I posted. Unfortunately we aren't very popular.

http://www.reddit.com/r/wemetonline/comments/2tsxx8/uscis_unacceptable_processing_times_please_sign/

http://www.reddit.com/r/LongDistance/comments/2tsln5/uscis_unacceptable_processing_times_please_sign/

If we could get more people even on VJ just sign the petition

https://www.change.org/p/uscis-distribute-the-current-caseload-between-tsc-csc-vsc-and-nsc

Honestly that's the least anyone can do here, but we seem to be having trouble garnering support even for that. We are only allowed to post about it in our November Filer thread or in the general forum though it seems. Kristin and I have been trying really hard to get as much exposure as possible and we aren't giving up anytime soon. Even after our eventual NOA2's and we move on, we don't plan on stopping.

I agree with you, its absolutely outrageous that our i-129F's seem to be taken less seriously than others. If it's cost- why not make us pay more? At this point I would absolutely pay more to have my case processed within a REASONABLE and PREDICTABLE time frame. Either way, since I came here and found out how much more time we are facing in this step, I had been seeing-red-raging. All of this rallying and contacting of reps is the only thing making me less miserable right now. I am so grateful for this site and the friends I have made (looking at you, Kristin ).

Hopefully some TSC'rs (employees and petitioners alike) will find relief in a transfer. That's the only thing that makes sense to do at this point, considering the obnoxiously fast pace CSC is moving. Petitioners who filed at the same time as me (November) already have their interviews scheduled? Nah, that's really not right at all. *not dwelling here because my rage will return haha*

At this point I would be happy if my application was adjunctated at the 5th month mark, but I won't hold my breath for that... and certainly not any sooner than that. My Senator has put in an inquiry and forwarded my original "statement of hardship" to USCIS, so we will see what kind of silly response we receive from that. My Congressman has replied but I need to call his office and speak directly with his Rep later this week, hopefully tomorrow, and come up with a came plan on how I would like them to address the issue with USCIS as a whole, I don't want them to put an inquiry on my application alone since the Senator has already done that... and I'm only at just over 2 months, hardly seems necessary at this point (from their processing time frames anyway).

Sorry this is kind of ramble-y... it's early and Im about to drive to work on an ice slick. Damn Juno...

Edited January 28, 2015 by stef_curls

[av8or1 246]

Hi stef!

Way cool, thank you for mentioning the work that my local rep has initiated. Hopefully with the collective effort we are making we can affect change. And I agree, I'm with you and KristinD, somehow doing *something* feels better to me than just sitting around, taking it up the yin-yang, though there's nothing wrong with that of course. 'Point being that the latter course of action tends to leave me feeling disheartened most of the time. And thus doing something, which I realize may end up having no effect whatsoever, somehow brings with it a sense of accomplishment. Even if I don't accomplish anything. Crazy sounding, I know, but ... hope you understand.

Regarding the notion that we I-129F types are not very popular, yeah I have experienced that in the past too. I call it the arroganamous factor. The few times I "made the mistake" of mentioning the fiancee visa issue to folk who are not involved and who have no knowledge of the process, let alone immigration as a whole (I was once asked "what is the visa lottery? Can I win a free paid visa card that way?" - oh brother) I encountered some rather strong reaction. Most had the initial surprise and shock that it would be so difficult to complete the process of legal immigration, but once that wore off then the arrogance in them reared its ugly head. They began to tell me how "sick" it was to want to marry someone from a foreign country, how "Americans should only marry other Americans", how I should "date my own kind", how desperate I must be and even how foreign marriages shouldn't be allowed at all. They proceeded to tell me that they were glad that it was so difficult and unfair because that would (and should) discourage others from following me down such a "mentally deranged" path. The conclusion of which was a general shunning of me and anything to do with me, and this was by so-called "friends." Let alone the reaction that strangers have, which has usually been little more than a deer-in-the-headlights stare kind of a thing, though the innocence factor of a deer stare was replaced with a "you're a sick serial-stalker aren't you" kind of look. Mind you, most of these folk didn't have a passport and had never been anywhere outside of the US. Save Canada. Or Mexico. But they asserted that they were Americans and I wasn't. I was just a grubby guy who couldn't get a woman in the US because no such women would have anything to do with me and how I deserved the horrible treatment that I was certain to receive from my "mail order bride." Yeah. Wow. Stunning. Anyway, enough rambling regarding that phenomenon...

As for the priority versus cost issue of the I-129F, I agree, I would be willing to pay a heftier fee for decent service. But it won't happen. Having been a federal employee in one of my past lives, I suspect that our fee is relatively low because the priority of our petitions is relatively low. Kind of a price-to-match-priority type of thing. Makes sense, but just conjecture, naturally. There was a discussion about an expedite fee for I-129Fs not too long ago and I think most all of us would be in favor of that and be willing to pay such a fee, but that too won't happen.

Adjudication times in the TSC? Well the number that's floating around right now is approximately 200 days, or about 6.5 months. And that's the "good." If they run around 8 months which I expect, that number rises to 244 days. So we'll see what the numbers show. Assuming that I am fortunate enough to get the 200 day result, that puts me at the end of March. And in my situation that will make things tight, but at this point, heck I'll take it. Better than 244 days, right? lol Gheez but that is sad in light of the CSC number. Whoop, don't wanna go down that thought path, so gonna stop right there.

Regarding the transfer of another batch of I-129Fs to the CSC, well I've been thinking about that. Assuming that they transferred roughly the same number as last August (3000) I'm not sure that as an early-to-mid September filer I'd make the cut. I mean that last batch transfer was for petitioners from April and part of May, so doing the math, that's what ... approximately 2000 new I-129F petitions each month for the TSC? And they're still finishing up June and beginning on July, so that would mean that such a ~3000-petition transfer would mean July and part of August. So it would seem that yeah, I wouldn't be in that batch. Given that the August transfer did little to increase the speed with which the TSC processes its I-129Fs, I dunno. I wouldn't expect to see much help really. But at least it could help those July and August filers and that would be something, a good result in my mind...

Contacting congressman/women and senators? Interesting subject that. Do it too early and you run the risk of using-up one of the real avenues you have to *attempt* to get something done at the USCIS (omsbudsman not included). And like someone else has mentioned recently, the lady in my congressman's office told me that their office (and the office of other congressional members and senators) had more influence with the USCIS a few years ago. Unfortunately, she added, too many folk who filed these petitions over the years have tried this route of getting their representatives involved and it has resulted in the USCIS being almost numb to it, virtually indifferent. After all, they don't answer to congress. Frustrating, just another example of the broken system.

Ok. Sorry for my ramblings this morning too! :D Gotta get some work done, yak with y'all later!

Thanks again for all of your work, KristinD too! And to everyone who has signed the petition!

Edited January 28, 2015 by av8or1

[retheisen 10]

The obvious solution is to privatize this whole process. If there were multiple corporations vying for our business then we could at least opt to pay a premium for premium service. As it stands, these service centers already operate as self funded entities. Why does the government need to be involved at all? Allow for some competition and profiteering and we will get a much better product.