Ratty and C

She arrives in 15 hours - on the plane now! OMG how can i sleep tonight?

My congressman helped us. Well, his aides Whether they help will depend on who the politician is. If you're in a situation where you need help it's at least a channel with some small chance of helping you instead of just waiting for a bureaucracy. If it has 1% chance of helping that at least helps some people, and when it helps it can help a heck of a lot, like in my case.

Congratulations to all the approved December filers, so great to see most are approved now Hang in there everyone else, your turn will be soon. I wonder how many of the Dec filers now are just people who didn't update their profiles?

btw, the 2go website never updated with tracking information for my fiancee's passport.

The first we knew about it was when 2go phoned to say the passport would be with my fiancee in 4 hours time. She's in Cebu.

I think it was 3 business days after the status changed to issued.

2go delivers on Saturdays too apparently, so i guess you'll get it Friday or Saturday, but it depends where your fiancee lives - i can't remember if you mentioned that.

Good luck and congratulations :.

Just remember when you answer about working in the US to say that you intend to work "When approved".

San Diego here too - north county. 10 days until she reaches POE!

Hang on i just realized POE is from Dr Strangelove, my favorite movie

I'd suggest that she does fix it, but that particular form is such a pain, we redid it twice mostly 'cos you can't even save the form, so each time you re-do it you need to be really careful that you didn't accidentally introduce fresh errors....which we did.

Because you have limited time i suggest don't throw away the old form just incase you end up finding an more significant error on the new form.

FYI the original mistake we made was so silly, i prepared the first version of the form for her and signed it mm-dd-yyyy instead of dd-mmm-yyyy - that part of the form isn't even included in the barcode but we prepared a new form anyhow to make sure.

Also, when my fiancee was at the interview she said they had found errors on some other peoples DS156 but they were letting them leave to go to an internet cafe and redo the form then return the same day, but i can't say they do that all the time, maybe it was just a light day for them.

I hope that helps and truly good luck

I thought you have to get married in your home state?

You can just book it online but she has to pay the fee first.

Book it here

https://cgifederal.secure.force.com/

and read this link for what you need to do

http://photos.state.gov/libraries/manila/19452/public/Revised%20K1%20Instruction_rtf2_rtf2.pdf

Good luck!

Congratulations...44 days until our wedding

A couple of reasons why, i live in San Diego (no big deal though to go to LAX) but i heard LAX is more hassle and also i do have some airmiles i can use to get the flight virtually for free even with just about 4 days notice, enough airmiles for business class for her which will be a nice treat.

I'll check with the airline though, thanks for the advice. The lack of AC won't bother her much i think - i'm the one that needs AC, she always feels cold even when it's too hot for me!

I'm researching which POE to use and i found a good flight from Manila to Tokyo to San Diego. Are there known problems for my fiancee to fly JAL, and change in Tokyo on the way here? It's a great flight for her time and distance wise, and i heard better things about SD POE than LAX, so the question is just if anyone knows of any problems going through Tokyo - special permission or clearances needed, anything like that?

Thanks and good luck to all!

We'll be using San Diego as POE pretty soon too (fingers crossed).

JAL has a great flight from Manila through Tokyo, only about 17 hours and if you happen to have British Airways avios miles you can use those to get a great deal with short notice.

I haven't been to the airport since they extended the terminal - do we still meet incoming international visitors at the same place, or did it move?

Many congratulations!

If you can manage somehow to watch the IT crowd (obviously brits have seen it) it's well worth it.

It was not even returned - we were lucky the congressman's aides managed to get on the case quickly and persuade the embassy to reconsider based on a couple of things i guess they hadn't before, like the age of the old case and the fact that my fiancee had not attended the previous interview - it seems they didn't take those things into account before, they just saw a previous case number and said denied. But....that's also what i asked them to consider when i phoned and was told there's no discretion on their part, they just have to return it. So, either congressmen carry weight when requesting the re-review or maybe something else in the background changed like the ex fiancee's case got removed from the system which then allowed the embassy to re-review within their own rules - either way it's the congressman that gave us the help we needed, and thank goodness they acted before it got to USCIS.

So, now we're just waiting to receive the passport back with the visa - hopefully by the end of next week, and we plan for her to fly here late this month! Wow it still hasn't sunk in after 2 weeks of trying to figure out how we'll manage for the next year to 18 months, we are both just grinning from ear to ear!

I really think most couples don't appreciate every moment they have together and those of us in an LDR can always remember how lucky we are to be together, it seems like such a small thing until you've been seperated like this, so i will never take it for granted.

Oh, and Celesty, if you're reading this - I love you with all my heart, see you soon honey! Mwahh!

Just to wrap up this thread and update everyone, tonight i called the embassy and they are ready to issue our visa, we just need to wait for the passport now. Contacting my congressman really seems like it worked! Good job Duncan Hunter, Holly, Dixie and team.

Good luck to all and thank you so much for all the advice, concern and good wishes!

Thanks Anna for such nice words! I see your UK flag, i was from England until 1996, born in Lancs and raised in Leicestershire+Yorkshire - what part are you from?

I just phoned the embassy. They said the visa is ready for issuance :) We just have to wait now for the passport i guess. OMG we're both so happy!

Thank you all for the good wishes and good luck to you all.

Thanks folks for all the kind wishes, i can't believe our dream may come true after the last 2 weeks of torment - i've been crossing my fingers all day. I just phoned the embassy but there was no-one available to tell me if we're approved, so i'll phone back later and post an update if there is news..

I can't believe it... i did everything i could to fix the situation but still in my mind we were in for a tough year plus of waiting. I hope it's good news - omg it would be so heartbreaking now if it goes wrong again.

Well, i think the lesson is that maybe they aren't immovable, there is some chance to get approved still if you can get on top of things quick enough and the circumstances just seem so strange. Thanks to Congressman Duncan Hunter and his aides for their help, and to the embassy staff for reconsidering.

And also, a sincere thanks to all the VJ members for your support and ideas, maybe one of those ideas is what made the difference.

Hi folks, maybe some of you have been following another thread i started about our embassy denial due to an expired 8 year old previous petition......well, tonight while we are skyping my fiancee got a phone call and when she returned she is so happy....it was the embassy, please send them the passport! I'm not sure of the exact wording....they reviewed or are reviewing our case again.

Maybe something i did paid off, but we're so happy..maybe we bypass a year in USCIS purgatory? You think we'll be approved? I know no-one knows for sure but i just had to post the update to let people know. I think maybe 2 things paid off, the congressman's people working behind the scenes to try and figure out the deal with the old petition and my phone calls to the embassy.

Sanity prevails maybe? :)

omg Ebunoluwa, sorry for your predicament, I hope it works out okay in the end. I can't even imagine how frustrated you must be. Doesn't it feel like the government is supposed to be there to help and protect us, but the biggest threat in our lives is them telling us who we can't marry and spend our lives with. Hard to imagine a bigger intrusion than that really.

Yup, what I mean by the limit of 2 petitions ever for the beneficiary was that it's 2 before a red flag is kicked up, not for a ban or something - same for the petitioner, it's just something that has to be addressed, not some sort of ban. Sorry I couldn't remember the exact post you meant, so many posts now.

Good luck with your petition and marriage - I guess we're just in it for the long haul, but at least once we're together we will appreciate every minute of it. I don't think most people realize how lucky they are.

Oh, and thank goodness for Skype - it's not 100% reliable, but it's pretty amazing for free!

Thanks for the replies Ebunoluwa, the more information and questions people ask the more future information future people will have to avoid the same problems.

I just got off the phone with the embassy, they said they are processing the visa for return to the USCIS, and that's what they told my congressman's aide last week. She said they have no discretion about this I asked to speak to a senior consular officer and the officer said they would just tell me the same. So I said i'd like to speak to one anyhow 'cos I really have to do pursue every avenue I can to resolve this, so she said to call back about 2:30pm their time 'cos all the senior officers are currently in interviews. She also said I just needed to talk to USCIS about this 'cos it's their job to resolve the issue, not the embassy's job and they aren't allowed to determine the status of the multiple petitions.

So, i'll phone back later. Maybe they'll at least give me or my fiancée some information about the other petition? Well, I doubt it but i'll ask. The FOIA may reveal that anyhow when we ask for the consular notes on our own petition.

Yeah, you're totally right without the 'about prejudice' part, if you re-file you basically get a denial if you're with CSC unless the previous petition is withdrawn.

I previously said the petitioner has a limit of 2 petitions within 2 years I think - maybe that's what you saw? Anyhow, there's some information here

http://www.ilw.com/articles/2007,0206-ellis.shtm

The lack of transparency drives me crazy too. Anyhow, consulting an attorney will hopefully give me more insight into what's likely to happen, and what I can do. I do think though we'll end up going the CR1 route.

Thanks again Ebunoluwa.

^{http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/87391.pdf}

^{Section 9 FAM 41.81 N6.8}

^{"In instances where more than one U.S. citizen fiancé(e) has filed visa petitions on
behalf of the same alien and more than one K-1 visa petition has been approved
for the same beneficiary, the consular officer must suspend action and return all
petitions with a covering memorandum to USCIS district director who approved
the last petition so that the petition approvals may be reviewed."}