Nellie&Jason

Hey guys! We sent in our AOS paperwork in the beginning of January, have our NOA1 date January 7, and haven't heard back so far. Moreover, my status on USCIS website is still "Acceptance". Do you think this is okay, or something needs to be done here?

Thanks,

N

And so, the story is that we filed our I129-F for a K1 Visa in late April, and although initially VJ timeline would suggest us a date in late August for initial approval, by now it was pushed back to the end of October. This made the two of us (as well as our families) go insane, worrying that I may not be able to get back to US before winter holidays.

Today, I was watching TV (it was late night in Armenia), when my fiance iMessaged me asking me to double check the USCIS website for the news. You probably can't imagine how I jumped off the couch and ran to my computer (with only one sleeper on, throwing all the pillows that I've been cuddling with on the floor), and YES, that was it! As of yesterday (October 15, 2012) our petition for fiancee has been approved!

This was so unexpected, and amazing, given people waiting for these news almost twice longer, but I am guessing we have been both diligent and lucky enough.

We want to wish everyone reading this posting the best of luck, and a tiny tip of advice for those who haven't filed yet - please make sure you work hardly and consistently on your paperwork. These people would not deny you for stupid details like not sticking your proof picture to a sheet of paper, or mentioning your fiance as a "husband" in one of your proof emails, but they really want to see clear, consistent relationship, that does not raise any questions. If you make sure your petition looks like this, you may be lucky enough to be one of the first approvals of your date:-)

Thanks to everyone!

The happy couple

Don't send anything without being asked for it. Considering you are from a low fraud country, there is a good chance you won't get an RFE for them and can just bring them to interview.

We sent like 10 lose photos, and haven't got them back, no RFE yet (it's been almost 6 months), so...

I am the beneficiary and I am from the Philippines. We agreed I do not want him to send me money for the petition process like visa fees, airfare, medical exam fees and such since I have saved something when I came there for a j1 visa while I was working. So, I do not have copies of any remittances at all, will this be questioned? Is there any way that the consul will ask for remittance receipt? Please share your views. Thank you.

I haven't received my NOA2 yet (should be here within a week of so), so I can't put my opinion as a fact, but I STRONGLY DO BELIEVE that this is not an issue at all.

I mean all these remittances are just another proof of your relationship, but if you have other evidence, I am so sure this is not required.

I hold a position of a health expert at the National Congress in my country, and also am a part time statistician for a US based research center, and my American fiance is only a graduate student, so obviously I make twice if not three times more than him - so it would be super illogical for him to provide me with any kind of financial support:-) So, we haven't even had that question when filing our petition - and I am more than sure that this is the last thing for you to worry about:-)

The adjudictors have a certain amount of leeway in approving petitions or doing an RFE or rejecting. I have previously had 2 fiancee petitions approved without letters of intent, others have had RFE's for those. I have never heard of a CENOMAR being requested at CSC but I'd say it might be within the realm of possiblity. Strange for sure, but not unimaginable. I've never filed a separate sheet with a longer "how we met" story, simply completed the box with the pertinent information. Maybe I was lucky, getting an adjudicatoI

Where is that "How we met" box located? I don't remember filing something like that.... I do remember however that we diligently described all three times that we met face to face witwhin last two years on a separate sheet of paper. Do you think this may be a problem and we will be sent an RFE for that???

Thanks, you are right... I forgot all about people being married before filing for K1... I think I should get a glass of wine and relax a little bit.

Oh, and yes! So far just 2 approvals on Igor's list today... never hated weekends like I do now!

Had the exact same thought this morning. For a person working 2-3 jobs for the last bazillion years it's pretty shocking to come to a realization of an idea that lately she started HATING weekends...

Unfortunately this is more than just normal. Some people who filed months before you guys did have nothing so far... Good luck with the journey!

Yes all is normal. If you get out to ten months waiting, then I'd schedule an InfoPass appointment.

This is so tough... and the closer it gets the more difficult waiting becomes. We are April 20 filers, and I feel like another week or two will destroy my nervous system completely... Congrats to everyone who's got approved lately - you guys make my day!

Why would she be issued a new card, the number doesn't change. There was no legal reason for the Op to destroy the card, it's never outdated or invalid. The reason behind usage may no longer be invalid, but the card itself is still a good document.

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I would still suggest her destroying it given it is a physical prove she (or her boyfriend) tried to use it to conduct illegal action. I mean if it had any other scratches, it would be different, but I can picture her applying for a waiver, where all these stories about her attempts to get an illegal job are gonna be discussed, and then someone bringing up this document, which is a direct prove that YES, SHE DID TRY to alter the card to make her illegal action work. So, I think not having this on her way would be helpful.

Also, like I mentioned in my previous comment, I also have a SSN card with that job restriction on it, and they told me at the US Embassy that once I get my green card, they are going to replace the SSN card with a new one - which doesn't have that restriction any more. Just to let you guys know that the number stays the same, but they do refresh the card every now and then whenever important variables change.

If you're admitted as a tourist, you don't work and you leave before your I-94 tells you to leave this shouldn't be a problem. It might cause trouble when re-entering or applying for another non-immigrant visa, but as far as an immigrant visa goes, you haven't done anything illegal - You've just covered yourself with big fat "immigrant intent" stickers.

As far as the social security card goes - I have a "Not authorized to work without DHS approval" social security card. I haven't tried to scratch it, but I can say almost for certain that that sentence does not scratch off without the card looking completely mangled - It would be like trying to scratch the "20" off of a $20 bill.

Okay, first of want to let you all know that I don't think scratching or not scratching makes too much difference. I have been a student in US for two years, and have a similar SSN card (which basically allows the holder to work ONLY when approved by the agency who sponsored visa, and obviously ONLY during the time that particular student visa hasn't expired). However I want to let you all know, that when I applied for jobs during my student years, no one ever asked me for a physical SSN card, all they needed was the number. Therefore I am sure scratching the text on it wouldn't be that much of a problem if OP wasn't trying to apply for a job [ illegally ] using it.

Calling attention to our cases is sure important. We did not call anyone when our five months was over since the official USCIS website changed the processing times from five months to much more. I thought as long as our case falls into their specified time frame, calling is of no help. But now I am giving it second thoughts.... may be we should call....

Anyway good luck, and I really hope you will move things with your call, then the next person to call is gonna be my fiance:-))))) (I am the international in our couple)

I am an April filer, and have been following timelines, discussions and statistics for almost six month on VJ. Haven't been posting frequently before, since I was trying to figure out what data is trustworthy and what is just some people going exaggerating stuff based on their own (truly unfortunate) experiences.

Around the time we filed (April 20) Vermont was REALLY slow, looking at Igor's list you could tell they approve about a tenth of what Cali Center does. Until the beginning of September situation kept getting worse and worse. Within a course of 4 months our estimated approval date moved from Aug to Oct.

However there is some good news as well. Starting September I noticed a positive trend in VCS working speed. Based on Igor's list (which I do understand is not really a great sample, but still...), the rate of daily approvals has increased in average from one to five. That is something worth mentioning. Given it took them three- four months to be done with 80% of VJ January applicants, they were done with about 70% of VJ March applicants within a course of a month. This gives me high hopes that things are improving.

Now, about 15% of VJ April cases have already been approved, which makes me think that in case our application doesn't have any missing info or any other discrepancies (I am really hopeful two PhDs were able to put a couple of sheets of paper together in a way that USCIS finds no flaws in it) we may be getting our NOA2 even before the six month mark (Oct 20).

So let's keep our fingers crossed and hope that things will continue getting better, in a way that ALL of us can get back with their loved ones soon!

wow.....

When US Government started supporting fiance reunions it took only two weeks to go through the whole process. Now we are looking to 8-10 months... and I can see why...

just a thought...

I know we are still somewhat far away from filing either a service request or contacting our congressman, but given how slow things move in VSC, I have a sad feeling that by the end of September (when our 5 months is due) we will need to do this.

So, from all the forums I've read I realized there is a particular sequence here: first you file a service request and then if that doesn't help contact your congressman, or what? I guess you can't do both at a time. But what if I want to see what's my case status, and only if they tell my congressman that they haven't looked at it yet, submit a service request? I mean again, what is the most effective way of dealing with this???

Mine took 81 days to get NOA2 but another 2 months to schedule the appointment

So hang in there

Was yours an expedited case or something?

145 days, and on second try as well so have been in the process a year. During our first filing, it was CSC that was about 6 1/2 months.

Why do you guys file the second time? Is it even legal? What about the fee that you've paid - is it transfered or something?

I so agree with you. CSC has already approved many March filers and others with older dates haven't even been looked at by VSC. As soon as mine reaches the 5month mark I'm calling my Congressman. Luckily I had already started the conversation with them. They said to call them back if I don't get my NOA2 by month 5. I agree this is so unfair. They should have ONE system that files are pulled from so that people who were just unfortunate to get VSC during their slow time don't get passed over because CSC is faster.

TOTALLY AGREE!!!

The Service Centers take turns at being "the slowest Service Center of them all". In September 2011, I filed my first petition. It took 6 months to hear from California. I just filed a couple more at California in April. It's been averaging about 3 months now which would put me at hearing something at the end of this month. I am very much aware that any day now (and for all I know, it may have already happened?!?!) things could switch and I could be back on the track to waiting 6 months!

No one knows what will happen, until it happens. It's an awful process and thank god we are (mostly) all strong enough to get through this!

GOOD LUCK EVERYONE!

So given your vast experience in following what has been going on in both centers for a while, and have noticed all the changes occuring, I wonder if you were able to notice a specific trend (timewise), of how frequently speed tends to change? In other words, can you say something like a particular center usually slows down for this or that amount of time, and then speeds up usually for say this amount of months?

Totally agree and I absolutely "love" replies like this one:

when someone is approved within/around the 5 months time and tell others that their time will come... well we all know our time WILL come, we would like to know WHEN and also WHY some people are approved earlier for others having to wait 6months +!

I am not picking on you @Linds&Youssef , all I am saying is that this is so unfair that it makes me wanna scream!

I think they were clear on at least one thing. They explained that they put off more "difficult" cases until they double check all the details, meanwhile aprove the "easy" ones that follow. Therefore, it makes sense that some of the cases do net get aproved in the order sent. I am an April filer, and all I do is hope that our case will seem straightforward enough for them not to delay it in any way, but grant aproval immediately [wishful thinking]:-)

I doubt this is true. I would be surprised if even .25% of the population is on this forum. How did you figure this out?

If you look up the K1 Forum, there's an interview posted with a person representing VCS. He said that about 20-30 cases get aproval daily. Given, the average aproval rate on VJ is 1 case per day, we can estimate the VJ sample to be about 3-5% of the actual population.

It could be. Without a measure of spread there is no way to determine the probability of this.

There are always periods of slow downs due to work load, supervisory and Obama requests slowing stuff down. They will return.

Does anyone have an estimate of how long these slow downs usually last? If I'm not mistaken it started slowing down in May 2012, now I wonder when should we expect things to go back to normal given past experiences?

We are April filers, and we can't believe we may have to wait longer than 5 months to get our paper work our of VCS:((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((

I'm really nervous about all of this going on at VCS! We are April filers and initially we expected our case to be getting out of VSC in August - no idea any more! So, for those who have been observing VSC work for longer than we have, have you noticed how long do these slow downs usually last? Like once they start working slower than usual (in this case in began in May) how long it takes them to get back to normal?

Hi everyone. Just starting a thread for April filers here. I was originally planning for March but complications made way for delay. Anyway, the finishing touches and reviews are going on now, and I plan to have it mailed by April 9th. Feel free to post your status and updates.

Same here, we were almost done by the end of March, somehow it took us over a month to finalize all the details, and got a NOA1 date of April 20th!

Over 2 months of waiting!!! I sure hope things move faster, The summer is just starting and i want it to be ending already as it means my love will be home sooner!!!! What are you guys doing to past the time?

This waiting is agonizing! Both of us are working full time, which kinda helps with killing the time, but still....

still waiting too. my noa1 date is april 2! have been reading the stats last year, april fillers get approved in july. crossing fingers!!!! goodluck to us all!!

" good things come to those who wait"

Yes, that would really be fantastic! To think about it, it's already July!!! Well, at least August - but I can't believe this may go into September!!!

I sure hope your prediction holds for this year. This waiting and waiting is agonizing to say the least. Best of luck to all.

It sure is!!

Our NOA1 date is April 20th, and the case is being processed at Vermont Service Center. I am wondering what is going on with Vermont regularly slowing down and stopping to work? And when are we guys expecting to have our NOA2s? Opened this thread to have all of us wait together:-)