U.S Citizen vs Permanent resident priority

[Andy & Val 493]

5 hours ago, Mimi@25 said:

For the filing of I-130 form, is name change a requirement before you submit your petition to USCIC office?

Name change is not a requirement but a bonus

A copy of your passport for proof of citizenship and your marriage certificate will do

[Adeya 30]

10 hours ago, Mimi@25 said:

Thank you fam for the replies and clarification.

 

Question.

I see most people actually making an album for the pics. Is it a requirement for the supporting documents to be in an album form? 

Send these so you dont get a RFE call an attorney & make sure 

[jeanieCZ 228]

12 hours ago, geowrian said:

State has no impact on service center. The service center is assigned based on an internal routing mechanism to balance load and priorities...nobody knows who will get a particular service center beforehand.

There are people who live in CA that get Vermont. There are people who live in new england who get Texas.

Indeed. I was surprised we got the California SC while my fiancee lives in Virginia!

[geowrian 22,335]

2 hours ago, jeaniecz said:

Indeed. I was surprised we got the California SC while my fiancee lives in Virginia!

Your case is a K-1. All I-129Fs for a K-1 are handled by CSC (with a few rare transfer to VSC for extended criminal checks).

[Ortolan 381]

Indeed, that's the best way, the only way, really, you can streamline your wait time to as short as is possible (that is in your control, I mean): to have everything exactly as it should be and don't leave anything off the list. Check and double-check, and make copies of what you send, so you'll know, "yep, I sent that.' Time gets added on when you get a notice that you've not sent a document they asked for, or filled out something incorrectly.

[NikLR 13,220]

3 hours ago, Adeya said:

Send these so you dont get a RFE call an attorney & make sure 

No. 

5 hours ago, Andy & Val said:

Name change is not a requirement but a bonus

A copy of your passport for proof of citizenship and your marriage certificate will do

No.  No one has to change their name.  It doesn't matter.  It's not a bonus. 

[davidvs 320]

12 hours ago, Mimi@25 said:

For the filing of I-130 form, is name change a requirement before you submit your petition to USCIC office?

My wife didn't change her name. We had a civil marriage ceremony and the clerk at city hall advised us to not have her name changed until after our immigration paperwork was completed since it would save the hassle of changing all her other documents or explaining why there were different names. Not sure if it really mattered or not.

[Fernthony 11]

54 minutes ago, davidvs said:

My wife didn't change her name. We had a civil marriage ceremony and the clerk at city hall advised us to not have her name changed until after our immigration paperwork was completed since it would save the hassle of changing all her other documents or explaining why there were different names. Not sure if it really mattered or not.

 

All you have to do is fill in all previous names and attach documentation for those name changes. My wife had a different name at birth, then changed it when she was young. After we got married, she registered her prior last name to her new middle name (didn't have a middle name before that), and then changed her last name to my last name. All we did was note all name changes and then include her name change documents, including translations obviously. It's only a small hassle, but not that big a deal in the grand scheme of things.

[Ben & Katy 168]

23 hours ago, Mimi@25 said:

Hi fam,

Is the waiting period for U.S Citizens to bring their spouse from abroad to USA shorter than for a Permanent resident? and how long of wait do U.S. Citizens have to wait for their i-130 filing to go through than Permanent residents?

Everything also depends on the country of the spouse you are petitioning and how backlogged that country's embassy is.  For example I petitioned my spouse from the Juarez,Mexico American embassy.  It took me 6 months for just the I-130 (petition) to get approved. After that another 4 months for the National Visa Center to process it and give me my numbers to continue to proceed at NVC.   After NVC completed the case and sent it off to our embassy (Juarez) it took another 3-4 months to get the interview.  Our process took 14 months.  It would have taken 20 months for the whole process if I had not asked for expedite for health reasons.  The part after the NVC phase is where it varies depending on the embassy.  Not sure what the wait time is in Cameroon after NVC is done.   At our embassy the wait time after NVC completes the case is almost another year just for the interview because of how backlogged they became. 

Edited August 7, 2019 by Ben & Katy