Just want to share our experience about the interview process with everyone.
Male living in Dallas, TX. Female Fiancee living in Toronto.
Just as other people have mentioned, you cannot get into the US Consulate until 7:40 AM.
Being one of the first in line at the door may or may not matter at this point.
My Fiancee and I arrived at the Consulate at 7:50 AM and once we were through Security, we were lucky to even find a chair to sit in.
We were told no cell phones, not bags, no purses, etc. We adhered to this. Once we got in, we saw people with all kinds of bags and even baby strollers. I would say to adhere to what you are told. You don't want to chance being turned away at the door.
The first key thing is that once you are directed to the waiting room, but before the elevator trip, it is paramount to sit near the elevator to get on first. Go to the back of the elevator as the rear doors will open when you get to the 19th floor.
We did not make it on the elevator for the first trip. We were on the second trip. Because of this, we were only "lucky" enough to get number A7. there were only 8 numbers taken for an Immigrant visa so we were next to last.
Be nice to the lady at the counter. Her job might not seem hard but she has to deal with a bunch of impatient people wanting visas.
The people at the windows that process the paperwork before the interview are the same people that process the paperwork for the non-immigrant visa folks. This includes student visas, work visas, and any other temporary visas. Non-immigrant folks did not get a number, they just stood in a line. There did not seem to be a priority order of how many non-immigrant visas were processed before they processed an immigrant visa. Over time, there were probably 70-80 people that were processed for a non-immigrant visa before we were processed with number A7. The goal here would be to get in the first set of 4, not the second set or further down the line. In our case, they called numbers in the order of A2, A4, A3, A1, A6, A5, A8, A7. So in the grand scheme of processing paperwork, we were last instead of next to last. It took almost 2 hours to get to this point. But it took only 10 minutes to verify or update the paperwork with stuff we had brought with us.
On the day we went, there was only one person doing interviews for Immigrant visas. Not sure if this is the norm.
For the Interview portion, A1 and A2 already had their interview even before we even had our paperwork processed.
Each interview did not have a set time limit, but it did go in order. So even though A1 had their paperwork processed 4th, they were interviewed first. So here is were being first off the elevator really matters.
A5 met with the Interviewer 3 times. Not sure what issue they were having.
We got called to the Interviewer at about 11:30AM. So almost 4 hours from when we arrived at the front door.
Our interview took all of 10 mins. We were easily approved.
Basic questions asked of the person immigrating were like:
1. How did you meet him?
2. What does he do?
3. How did he propose?
4. What does he do for a living?
5. How do you stay in contact with each other?
6. Have you been to visit him?
The key thing to remember through all the waiting is --- "You have waited for many months to get this far. You can wait a few more hours".
Side note: There is a soda machine and a snack machine. They take only Canadian money. The snack machine only takes "old-style" money.
K-1 Visa Approval
in Canada
Posted
Just want to share our experience about the interview process with everyone.
Male living in Dallas, TX. Female Fiancee living in Toronto.
Just as other people have mentioned, you cannot get into the US Consulate until 7:40 AM.
Being one of the first in line at the door may or may not matter at this point.
My Fiancee and I arrived at the Consulate at 7:50 AM and once we were through Security, we were lucky to even find a chair to sit in.
We were told no cell phones, not bags, no purses, etc. We adhered to this. Once we got in, we saw people with all kinds of bags and even baby strollers. I would say to adhere to what you are told. You don't want to chance being turned away at the door.
The first key thing is that once you are directed to the waiting room, but before the elevator trip, it is paramount to sit near the elevator to get on first. Go to the back of the elevator as the rear doors will open when you get to the 19th floor.
We did not make it on the elevator for the first trip. We were on the second trip. Because of this, we were only "lucky" enough to get number A7. there were only 8 numbers taken for an Immigrant visa so we were next to last.
Be nice to the lady at the counter. Her job might not seem hard but she has to deal with a bunch of impatient people wanting visas.
The people at the windows that process the paperwork before the interview are the same people that process the paperwork for the non-immigrant visa folks. This includes student visas, work visas, and any other temporary visas. Non-immigrant folks did not get a number, they just stood in a line. There did not seem to be a priority order of how many non-immigrant visas were processed before they processed an immigrant visa. Over time, there were probably 70-80 people that were processed for a non-immigrant visa before we were processed with number A7. The goal here would be to get in the first set of 4, not the second set or further down the line. In our case, they called numbers in the order of A2, A4, A3, A1, A6, A5, A8, A7. So in the grand scheme of processing paperwork, we were last instead of next to last. It took almost 2 hours to get to this point. But it took only 10 minutes to verify or update the paperwork with stuff we had brought with us.
On the day we went, there was only one person doing interviews for Immigrant visas. Not sure if this is the norm.
For the Interview portion, A1 and A2 already had their interview even before we even had our paperwork processed.
Each interview did not have a set time limit, but it did go in order. So even though A1 had their paperwork processed 4th, they were interviewed first. So here is were being first off the elevator really matters.
A5 met with the Interviewer 3 times. Not sure what issue they were having.
We got called to the Interviewer at about 11:30AM. So almost 4 hours from when we arrived at the front door.
Our interview took all of 10 mins. We were easily approved.
Basic questions asked of the person immigrating were like:
1. How did you meet him?
2. What does he do?
3. How did he propose?
4. What does he do for a living?
5. How do you stay in contact with each other?
6. Have you been to visit him?
The key thing to remember through all the waiting is --- "You have waited for many months to get this far. You can wait a few more hours".
Side note: There is a soda machine and a snack machine. They take only Canadian money. The snack machine only takes "old-style" money.