K1 visa delay

[Duncan J Reyneke 1]

Hi everyone. This is a long post, so the TL;DR version is:

Our K1 application was submitted to USCIS, and received, but they had a problem mailing us our first notification, and now we're worried that the time spent changing the address caused a huge delay in our application timeline. If the USCIS can't mail you your NOA1, does the entire application get held up for the amount of time it takes to fix the mailing problem? Also, we've since changed our mailing address, and they've sent us an NOA1 to that address, but the status on the USCIS website for our application hasn't changed from when they told us about the problem, initially. Is this normal? Has anybody else had that experience?

My fiance and I applied for the K1 fiance visa on December 5 last year, and received a notice of receipt from the DOHS USCIS office on December 9.
We were living in South Korea, at the time. After receiving this, we then waited for more than a month to receive our NOA1. In January, while waiting,

we found a notification that we'd missed, saying the USCIS office had tried to mail us some documents, but that they'd had run into trouble with our

mailing address. The documents had been returned to their office on December 22, less than two weeks after they'd received them. This was

frustrating, firstly, as we'd used the same address in the past to mail things from the US to us in Korea, without any problems, but we went through

the process and changed the address on the form to her mother's address in Florida, on January 20. On January 23rd, they mailed us an NOA1

with a new notice date of January 23rd.

The first concern we've had, since then, has been that the status of our case on their website still says:

 

"On December 22, 2016, the Post Office returned your document to us. We will hold your document for 180 days or until June 20, 2017. Please go

to www.uscis.gov/e-request to request that we resend the document to you. If you do not submit an online request by June 20, 2017, we will destroy

your document and you will need to file a new Form I-129F, Petition for Fiance(E), with fee. If you move, go to www.uscis.gov/addresschange to

give us your new mailing address."

So we're not sure why it still shows this message, given that we've gotten the NOA1 and our mailing address is working. Anybody else out there have

the same experience as us? The operator we spoke to assured us it wasn't an issue, because it's on record that we've received mail to that address,

but it makes it hard to gauge where we are in the process.

Secondly, and more urgently, which of our dates will the USCIS use, now? The original submission date of December 9th, when they acknowledged the

receipt of our first application? Or January 23rd, when we got our NOA1? We're a little disheartened right now, because it seems like a mailing address

problem caused a huge delay in our application. The California Service Center is currently processing applications from December 25th - do we

need to wait a full month before they arrive at ours?

Thanks for your help. Hopefully we'll join all of you soon.

[C-ma'am 684]

**Post moved from K1 Process to Progress Reports.

 

Hi Duncan, just as you were informed over the phone, now that you have received the NOA at the new address, this is a non-issue. The setback cannot be too big, considering you corrected the address. Use the date on the NOA you received at the new address as a reference.

 

Also, yes, it's extremely common for USCIS to have outdated information on their website. Do not sweat it.

 

This is a very tedious process but it's not complex. Don't complicate it by overthinking it. Arm yourself with patience and try to occupy your mind with other things. Time will go by faster!