Jarrod&Vicky

Hi!
I didn't stay for the 6 months that I was given. I just stayed for 20 days since at the time I was still working in Argentina, so your girlfriend's case seems to be different (I still had strong ties to my country) Why they gave me six months? I have no idea. I guess it had something to do with the fact that I had been in and out of the country on that B1/B2 several times and I had never over stayed, I guess... they just stamped it for 6 months. I think the best thing you can do is just be honest at the POE, tell them that you are here waiting for the NOA2 but that you are totally aware that you have to go back for the interview and that you don't want to overstay your b2.
Good luck!

Hola!
We had the same situation as you do guys. My husband (back then fiancé)had been living as a "tourist" in Argentina for 3 years by the time we filed the petition. The only difference is that he always kept his condo, which was being rented out, and that was the address we use in the form I-129F (you would have to use you parent's from what you're saying). Now, when it comes to the G-325A Form (Biographic Information) make sure that you complete "Applicant's residence for the last five years" with your Argentinean address. In that way, you are not lying about the fact you are in Argentina but you also completed the 129 form with the US address that they are requesting.
My husband had his own company and he was filing US taxes from Argentina during those year, I don't know how your situation is (working as a "tourist" in Argentina)... but I'm sure you know you have to show that you've been making certain amount of money to support you and your future husband/wife, and you need to send your tax returns from previous years. (read the guides, you can have you parents or someone as a co-sponsor if you don't meet the requirements).
Hope it helps.
Vicky

Hi! If the exam is the same as for k1 holders, you don't need to fill out any form. Just make sure you bring all your vaccines records and the doc will be the one filling out the right form. On the first visit he'll send you to have a chest x ray taken (cheap way to check for TB) and a blood test (just checking for stds, only Sifilis if I can recall correctly). On the second visit he does a basic physical exam and hands you an envelope with the results. No gynecological exam, no urine... You've been reading way too much VJ! Lol
Nothing weird, relax. If you're going to see Dr. Kelly, he's great!

Correct me if I'm wrong... But we were advised to do the K1 route instead of adjusting for a B1/B2 (in Argentina we are not part of the VWP anymore and I had my B1/B2 issued many years ago and had been using it) because when you Aos from a tourist visa, even though the chances of everything working out fine are big, you are creating a problem for the family members of the K1 holder. Heard stories (outside of this board) where family members from, in my case, Argentinians, went to get a visitors visa to be able to visit the person on the US and were denied on the simple question "if your family member came and applied for a non immigrant visa and eventually used it to stay (we let them adjust due to marrying to a usc, and as a courtesy to the usc), how can I be sure that you won't be doing the same thing specially now that you have your daughter (or whatever the case may be) in the Country?
This info might be wrong, but just in case, and since we want my parents to be active members in our future children's life here in the US, we went the K1 way. I wouldn't want to jeopardize their chance of getting a B1/B2 visa renewed in their case.

Correct me if I'm wrong... But we were advised to do the K1 route instead of adjusting for a B1/B2 (in Argentina we are not part of the VWP anymore and I had my B1/B2 issued many years ago and had been using it) because when you Aos from a tourist visa, even though the chances of everything working out fine are big, you are creating a problem for the family members of the K1 holder. Heard stories (outside of this board) where family members from, in my case, Argentinians, went to get a visitors visa to be able to visit the person on the US and were denied on the simple question "if your family member came and applied for a non immigrant visa and eventually used it to stay (we let them adjust due to marrying to a usc, and as a courtesy to the usc), how can I be sure that you won't be doing the same thing specially now that you have your daughter (or whatever the case may be) in the Country?
This info might be wrong, but just in case, and since we want my parents to be active members in our future children's life here in the US, we went the K1 way. I wouldn't want to jeopardize their chance of getting a B1/B2 visa renewed in their case.

Correct me if I'm wrong... But we were advised to do the K1 route instead of adjusting for a B1/B2 (in Argentina we are not part of the VWP anymore and I had my B1/B2 issued many years ago and had been using it) because when you Aos from a tourist visa, even though the chances of everything working out fine are big, you are creating a problem for the family members of the K1 holder. Heard stories (outside of this board) where family members from, in my case, Argentinians, went to get a visitors visa to be able to visit the person on the US and were denied on the simple question "if your family member came and applied for a non immigrant visa and eventually used it to stay (we let them adjust due to marrying to a usc, and as a courtesy to the usc), how can I be sure that you won't be doing the same thing specially now that you have your daughter (or whatever the case may be) in the Country?
This info might be wrong, but just in case, and since we want my parents to be active members in our future children's life here in the US, we went the K1 way. I wouldn't want to jeopardize their chance of getting a B1/B2 visa renewed in their case.

Correct me if I'm wrong... But we were advised to do the K1 route instead of adjusting for a B1/B2 (in Argentina we are not part of the VWP anymore and I had my B1/B2 issued many years ago and had been using it) because when you Aos from a tourist visa, even though the chances of everything working out fine are big, you are creating a problem for the family members of the K1 holder. Heard stories (outside of this board) where family members from, in my case, Argentinians, went to get a visitors visa to be able to visit the person on the US and were denied on the simple question "if your family member came and applied for a non immigrant visa and eventually used it to stay (we let them adjust due to marrying to a usc, and as a courtesy to the usc), how can I be sure that you won't be doing the same thing specially now that you have your daughter (or whatever the case may be) in the Country?
This info might be wrong, but just in case, and since we want my parents to be active members in our future children's life here in the US, we went the K1 way. I wouldn't want to jeopardize their chance of getting a B1/B2 visa renewed in their case.

Hi! If the exam is the same as for k1 holders, you don't need to fill out any form. Just make sure you bring all your vaccines records and the doc will be the one filling out the right form. On the first visit he'll send you to have a chest x ray taken (cheap way to check for TB) and a blood test (just checking for stds, only Sifilis if I can recall correctly). On the second visit he does a basic physical exam and hands you an envelope with the results. No gynecological exam, no urine... You've been reading way too much VJ! Lol
Nothing weird, relax. If you're going to see Dr. Kelly, he's great!

You can file now and include 2011 taxes, or wait and file with your 2012. It makes no difference so long as your income qualifies either way. There is no deadline to file for AOS.

You are spot on. Denials come when someone is simply not qualified for whatever reasons. The most common one I have seen here is not meeting within 2 years (or complete lack of evidence to support it). Pending divorces could be another biggie and history of multiple petition filings. I'd say that most people that have met the guidelines of meeting in 2 years and being free to marry wouldn't be denied as long as they submitted things to show these qualifications. Most things really can be settled with an RFE though.

We just got approved. Hang in there. Yours will come.

This is becoming intense!!!

:dance: NOA 2 text in 187 days !!!!!. Don't know what to do or how to act, still don't believe it, and provably won't until I have the hard copy on hand.
Thank god for this site and the wonderful members that are willing to share their trials and tribulations; without it I would have gone completely insane.
To all of you waiting for Vermont approvals: Hang in there and don't dispair, it seems like things are getting better and they're picking up the pace.
Good luck to all

Hello guys, we have been approved today after 6 months waiting yaaaaay!!!

I wish folks would keep their preaching to themselves or in their closets.
I'm headed to see Susan next month so I'm focusing on that instead of the K1 which may or may not happen this year the way Vermont is going.

VSC is making me run out of this specific virtue...

Whenever i get approved, im not gonna make a new topic and celebrate out of respect for the other people here.
I saw just now someone got approved at 70 days.. Really?? I know theyre happy and all and its not their fault. But it makes us who have been waiting 5,6 months here even more frustrated

Feb is at 78 on Igors list. On an average there's an approximate of 100 Approvals for each month. But usually the following Month (in our case March) starts being worked on when the previous month (Feb for now) hits around 75 on that list)
Its all just statistics, not really accurate since VJ is a small portion of the total of filers, but its something that that tells us that any day now March approvals are gonna start pouring in.
Maybe at this point anything seems like hope haha

Good news for April filers at VSC! I ran through some numbers from March 26 filers and there were 5 RFE's given on Aug 17!!!! There were no approvals but there is movement in late March!!! Cross our fingers!!!!!

Both Service Centers go up and down with production averaging a five month target date. They are contractors mostly so their production is monitored and most likely effects their evaluations and as contractors they are required to meet obligations otherwise the State Department would most likely look for another contractor when it comes up for bid. Knowing this and calling the contractors does not do much good UNLESS you are beyond the five month window and then they actually would look into your petition.
HOWEVER, calling attention to outside forces like Congressmen or State Department won't REALLY do anything for YOUR petition if it isn't five months yet. BUT looking at the congestion and if there are a NUMBER of inquiries about the situation then management of the USCIS would take notice and start making some changes to offset complaints. Then again, maybe they don't care.
I'm not writing concerning MY petition, I'm writing to understand what the problem is and what plans are in place to meet their stated goals.
I'm wondering if the loss of the 100 workers that began in 2009 at St Albans is feeling an effect.

I want to personally appologize to all VJ'ers that are going through the delay at VSC. See it seems I always pick the wrong line at groceries store checkouts, check in lines at airports and now since I live in Florida I got Vermont chosen for me
Leave it to me to bring a knife to a gun fight and be at the airport when my ship comes in
Good luck to us all.. I thought a little humor today might help everyone. Waiting sucks I know...

Hi VJ
I thought it would be useful for other people to be aware of Additional Processing (also known as Administrative Processing or just AP). I had a smooth process for the K1 filing. There is a fantastic guide on here that tells you EVERYTHING you need to do in order for your K1 visa petition to go through first time (http://www.visajourn.../content/k1flow). The key thing is follow every single step of it to the word. I did this and sailed through the first part of it.
Ok, so I sailed through the first part of the K1 visa process, so what happened you may be wondering? My petition came back in 3 and a half months, earlier than the 5 months we expected. In this time I had already obtained my police certificates from 2 countries and my military records, as well as filled out all of the necessary forms that I would need to send to the embassy, once they asked for them (found these online). I was prepared like you would not believe. Everything went smoothly, I attended my medical and when I arrived for my interview at the US Embassy in London on April 16th, the first person was appreciative for my well organised pack, which made her job a lot easier (i just put the paperwork in a logical order. Anything to help).
The next step of the interview was to answer some questions. This person wasn't as friendly as the first and asked me lots of questions about our relationship. These went fine and then it went down hill.
I was told they didn't need anything else from me and that my case just required some additional processing which would take 2-3 weeks. I thought "fair enough" and took the blue piece of paper they gave me and walked out. When I looked at the blue piece of paper when I walked out, it said that I had been refused a visa and that my case was under additional processing. This was a shock to me because the lady at the embassy said nothing to me about a refused visa, she indicated everything was fine. Now, for those of you in Additional Processing, this is where my experience may help you.
I got home and immediately googled what this all meant. The message boards were all negative, horror stories of things taking over 6 months to be sorted out etc. I didn't panic too much though because my application was all neatly assembled, with more evidence than they needed, not a single mistake on the forms, so I must have been different.
At the end of the 3 week period, I called the London Embassy to find out what was happening, as I had not heard back. The call was not helpful at all. The operator was unfriendly, unsympathetic and just told me that my case was in additional processing, they can't talk about my case, and it will take anywhere from 2-3 up to 16-22 weeks. This wasn't good. I wasn't given this impression at the embassy and this totally screwed up many plans we had made.
We tried many things. I called the embassy a couple more times, including Washington to see if they could tell me more. Nothing good came of it, I got the same message, time and time again. My fiancee contacted her Congressman who enquired on our behalf, with his office also contacting members of the Department of State they knew. Again, they got the same response as us. The case is in AP and we just have to wait.
Further research showed us that you are most likely to be put in to AP for the following:
- You didn't submit documents (don't panic too much, this is a quick AP process for you guys)
- They don't believe your story (so they'll inform you of this and tell you they are sending the pack back to USCIS to do further checks)
- You have a surname that originates from a country, predominately in the Middle East and North Africa (doesn't matter if you've never lived in those countries, it's just the name)
- You have a background in Science, IT or other special interest areas that the US feel could be a threat
- You have served in a foreign military other than the US
There are probably other reasons for finding yourself in AP but they are the most common. From my understanding, when your paperwork is shown at the first window at the embassy, they gather it all, go through it and one of the final steps is to run your name through several security systems. if there is a potential name match with a person of interest (muslim names are obviously common in the current climate) the system prevents the visa being approved and manual checks have to be carried out by people back in the US. How long this takes depends on the agency/departments dealing with it.
If I had known about this before this whole process had started, I would have factored more time in to my plans (so my hopes didn't get dashed) and prepared myself mentally for the fact that it could take up to 22 weeks. I'm writing this post so that others can pre-empt this and prepare emotionally. I didn't know and it made my life hell. PLEASE, if you feel you have any of the above things that could put you in AP, just prepare yourselves for the fact that it could happen to you.
So, why do I care about your emotions. Well, the first reason is because as you'll find out, the embassy doesn't give a damn. You can't blame them really because they need to take emotion out when they are dealing with serious matters. In saying that, there is a line between distancing emotions and treating people with respect and understanding when calling for updates on their case. I had a dealing with an embassy rep just 2 weeks ago and just being polite on the phone and explaining things to me, it made a huge difference. I was actually happy when ending the call, not angry and frustrated like previous times.
Anyway, I digress. The next reason I am typing this is to tell you what you will go through if you do not prepare for AP:
- A whole lot of not knowing. This was the worst thing for me because I had played the game, filled in their lengthy forms and done everything right, so why was it taking so long. My advice, don't take it personal. It's just a process that you unfortunately may have to go through
- Depression. I am one of the most confident and easy going people you will meet. I am able to cut off my feelings so I don't get hurt....until it came to this. I think because the love of my life was waiting for me and they were playing with my life now, it got to me more than anything has before. I lost all motivation to do things, found it hard to work out and had a constant negative attitude towards things. This was not me and this is the biggest reason i'm writing this post. Just accept you'll be waiting in this process and plan for the full 22 weeks. It's the only way to stay sane.
- Calling the embassy and contacting your congressman etc....it does not work. Save yourself the time, money and future dashed hopes when you hear nothing back and just wait for the visa to come through. If you have nothing to hide, you have a genuine relationship, all will be fine. This remember is a bureaucratic process that you unfortunately got caught up in. It's not personal, it's just that a system forced manual checks to take place.
- Don't think your individual circumstances can change things, they can't, I tried. My frustration came with the fact that the I not only served in the military during 9/11 and the Afghan and Iraq conflicts, but I was also security cleared with the NSA (National Security Agency of America). Yes, if they can trust me with sensitive information, surely that should speed up a visa security check, right? WRONG!!! It does not matter. Although you see yourself as special and unique, you're not in this process. You're just in line and you have to.....yes, you're getting it now I'm sure.....WAIT!!!!
- I was told not to travel to the US because I would get turned away due to the visa having been refused. Although the embassy do not class this as a visa refusal (so why give us a refusal form?), the Border and Customs people do. If you can't give a reason why you got refused, they just won't let you in, simple.
- Leading on from the above point, I was unable to travel to the US to see my fiancee. This was really hard, so what we did was we brought our honeymoon forward and had a pre-wedding honeymoon. Hey, we can't leave the country for 3 months after we're married until I get Advance Parole, so we figured we'd do this. It worked for us because it was a much needed time where we forgot about everything bad and focussed on us.
There are probably more things but this post is dragging on a little now. You'll be glad to hear (I don't mean to rub it in people's faces) that yesterday (15 weeks and 5 days after going in to AP) that I received an email from the embassy telling me to send in my passport so they can issue the visa. I am not exaggerating when I say it was one of the happiest days of my life. Having felt so low to finally knowing we can carry on with our lives, it was an amazing feeling.
So, to sum up, here are my steps to surviving AP if you find yourself in it:
- Just wait and do not call the embassy, it does not help and just costs you money
- Do not call your congressman, it does you no good
- If you have a muslim sounding surname, expect to be in AP for up to 16 weeks or so and add this to your plans (better to be safe than depressed, believe me)
- Try and carry on with your life (it's easier if you already know you may be put in AP)
- Have a strong support network around you who can keep you busy and not thinking about this
- Set yourself things to aim for. The worst thing of this for me is that I felt like my life was on hold and I was powerless in moving forward. Take the time to take up a new hobby, where you do something maybe 3-4 weeks down the line. Goal setting will help.
- Last of all, just accept that this process has many flaws, the embassy aren't there to be your friends and lastly, it's not personal. They system forces checks and if you end up in it, your'e just unlucky.
I hope this helps those in AP, prepares those who could get put in to AP and makes those that didn't go in to AP realise that you were so damn lucky haha.
This is just my view, from my experience and from the information I came across. All cases are different and we can only speculate as to what happens inside the embassy and their processes. This is my best effort at trying to make sense of it though.
Feel free to comment and especially if you are in AP and are finding it hard, please feel free to comment or message me. If I can help just 1 person feel slightly better, this post will have served its purpose.
Thanks
Kam

Hello All
I had a great opportunity Saturday evening to have dinner with and spend several hours with a director at the VSC. He is currently in charge of the department that handles I-751s among other things. His wife is an adjusicator that handles YOUR petition (if it went through VSC). His wife is Russian, arrived on a K-1 and is now a citizen. This man has worked for USCIS for many years and was at several local offices before being assigned to the VSC. His wife is a friend of Alla's and we were all at a dinner party for several American/Russian/Ukrainian couples Saturday. We had a long chat, he was very open and helpful. We talked about a lot of the things we see here on VJ and I was trying to remember all the "usual questions" I read about and pin him down for some answers. I also have asked him if he will give an "official interview" for VJ. He said he will check out the site and I will call him later this week. So, anyway I will try to cover what we discussed, he was quite frank and direct in his answers, not rude, not at all, but he knows his stuff and answers without hesitation. It turned into an impromtu and fun "interview" with me trying to remember all the hot button issues I see on VJ
I told him that the number ONE and number TWO "complaints" I see are Why is the VSC taking so long and why can't we get through to you guys?
Why is VSC taking so long, what happened? I was approved in 58 days!: We had problem with labor last year and lost many workers, we hired more last November and it took some time to get them trained. Some of the petitions were sent to California and we also assign people to different tyopes of visas. They will concentrate on one tyoe, get behind on another and then shift many people back to the other type. Lately we have shifted many, almost all, adjudicators to I-129fs, so that should make people happy. They will do that until they get caught up. Summer is a busy time for I-129fs, usually about June we get slammed with them. The winter or early spring is the slowest time for I-129fs, but then it depends what they have everyone working on also.
OK, why can't we get through to you? The 1-800 line is useless. Those are contract employees and they are trained to select answers from a menu of 14 answers. They pick which one is best for your question. There are thousands of visas being processed at any time and everyone is special and everyone has special circumstances and if we had direct lines we weould do nothing but field requests by petitioners to give them priority, we just can't do it. How would you feel if your petition got bumped because some woman called and cried on the phone and then her petition got moved up ahead of yours. We simply have to operate in a way that avoids any chance of fraud, corruption or unfairness.
So what about some people get approved ahead of others? Sme petitions have problems or delays, we do not hold back others for this. If an adjudicator has problems, he puts that one aside or sends an RFE and goes on to the next. The next one may be clean and gets approved right away, in just a few minutes, they adjudicate 15-20 petitions a day per person, and the ones with problems may wait weeks for the petitioner to respond to the RFE, or maybe it is a name check they are waiting for. Petitions are assigned as they arrive, when we are working on those petitions, but they do not go out the door in the same order they came in.
G-325a, Signed or Unsigned? Unsigned.
WHAT? Ok I have seen the memo but lots of VJ members got RFEs for unsigned G-325s, what gives? They do not have to be signed,they can be signed at the consualte interview. Some adjusicators haven't read all the memos, we get hundreds of the things, and maybe they make a mistake. If you want to be sure there is no mistake, sign it. Or send a letter expalining why it is not signed and request it be signed at the interview. Do you have that memo?
It is on the VJ website somewhere You can print a copy of that and send it with the I-129f and G-325a.
Fiancee intent letter? Signed or unsigned? Signed.
What about a faxed or emailed signature? When I was adjudicating, if I could see a signature, I accepted it, but many adjusicators will not. Signed is better.
Lawyer or no lawyer? For what?
Enough said. Now a hot issue, a very controversial one. There seems to be a trend in some countries of foreign men marrying American women and the women are considerably older. There is always a question if this is a problem. It never seems to be a problem for older men/younger women (My wife is 13 years younger, his wife is also considerable younger than him) Is it a problem? For us, USCIS, no. "Free to marry".
What about the consulates or for AOS or I-751? Consulates do what they do, it is not USCIS, some of them are bastards. Kiev is easy, they approve everyone (laughs), they used to be bastards but they got easier since they first started doing those in 2005, before then you would have had to go to Warsaw, you know. For AOS if they can prove they are legitimate we do not care about age but anything that is "not normal" for the culture will draw suspicion. They probably will not get a no questions asked interview (I had told him our AOS was "no questions asked")
What about birth certificates, some people have trouble getting them? This is a problem for us also. Some people, especially our younger staff, think all the world is like the USA. I remember one, when I was in the Kansas City office, the beneficiary was from Viet Nam, she was born in 1954 there was no birth certificate. The CO asked me about this and I looked at the file. I said "Do you know what was going on in Viet Nam in 1954?" She looked at me, straight faced and said "What, their computers were down?" If a birth certificate cannot be obtained they can usually get something from a church, a village official, something, and send that with a letter of explanation. Or just their passport and a letter explaining the situation (this applies to AOS more than I-129f as beneficiary birth certificate is not required for the petition, but I wanted to ask anyway, it seems a common question here)
What about extra documents? Proof of relationship? We don't need it, only that they have met for the fiancee visa.
What about the consulates? Consulates do what they do, as I said, some are bastards. They get whatever we get when it is sent on. I can't tell you what NVC and consulates do, I know some are terrible and some are really easy, but I do not know all the details of each. Kiev is easy, western Europe is easy, Nigeria is horrible, but you would not believe the scams from Nigeria, I get jaded. I am surprised a lot of them get visas and then we have to deal with them.
I have to ask for a collegue, Ecuador? Bastards.

What about changes? Are there any in the works? Is Obama ouching you guys to work faster? I am not sure Obama knows we exist. There have been no changes and no pressure other than the usual workload and shifting things around. I do not expect any immigration changes in the next year or two, at kleat not in rules or amnesty or anything like that. I do expect FEE INCREASES within the next year...across the board.
How much more? I cannot say, that is not my area, I just hear talk.
He added, "We try not to deny petitions, people really get angry and make lots of trouble. Denials usually come at the consulate or maybe AOS or sometimes even with the I-751. If we deny someone we need good reason, if they meet the criteria, we will approve it, they just have to give us what we need to approve them."
So how can I speed up my petition? You can't really. If it gets to be too long and if you can get a congressman or senator to call, that will get some action, but half the time those guys dont'' call or they do and the petition has only been there 3 months. Sometimes one falls through the cracks, gets overlooked, we are human. A congressman can get through and get them to dig it out if it has been too long, but I wouldn't call that "speeding it up". That's a fix for whn it is too slow.
we talked for some time more, about 5 hours altogether, briefly interrupted by Alla every now and again who had her own questions about the I-751 procedure which I posted in that forum, about VJ and other topics (his Navy days) He said he will check the site and gave me his home number. He said "call anytime but not 3 in the morning" I asked about an interview or answering prepared questions, he said possibly, he will check the site. He said many internet sites are advertisement for immigration attorneys or instructing people on how to pull scams, I assured him he would be very pleased with VJ and he thinks it is great that there is a good site for information and advice. (he never heard of VJ before this)
I can also say, that speaking to him, I heard so many of the same buzzwords or advice that I have seen right here, this is really a great site with some great folks giving some really great info.

Since Vermont is so far behind California why don't they just send some petitions to Cali. Its not fair that the January and February filers from Vermont have been waiting all these months and California is approving applications dated late March and early April. They need to balance this out.

Dear VJs, it has been ridiculous that VSC has been huge delayed in processing K1 Visa while its official website still posting the normal processing time of 5 months. I am pretty sure there are hundreds of ppl have been waiting for more than 5 months. I would suggest that we petitioners unite together to write a letter to USCIS director Alejandro Mayorkas and ask USCIS for an official explanation of the huge delay at VSC, and they need to provide an appropriate solution to catch up. It is not fair that they are ruining and messing up our life without a clear statement. We cannot just sitting here in an endless waiting.