Salt&Pepper

14 hours ago, sweetswinks said:

Let us know when you've received your green card!

Tuesday 6/5 

56 minutes ago, sweetswinks said:

 

The 17 just means the year it was filed what are the other 3 digits? That determines the day they're working on right now. So for instance mine is EAC17243 so yours would be in the 200 range too.

Got it, the other 3 are 224

1 minute ago, sweetswinks said:

Nice! Glad the wait is over for you! What were the first 5 digits of your case number? EAC17???
 

Yes, EAC17.  Sorry I didn't realise it was something that could be interpreted 

Now to move out to Seattle, set up some roots and apply for N-400!

22 minutes ago, sweetswinks said:

 

Congratulations on your approval! 

Thanks!

So I logged in and turns out I didn't even set up the notification 

Anyway, this is what it says:

On June 1, 2018, we mailed your new card for your Form I-751, Petition to Remove Conditions on Residence, Receipt Number EACXXXXXXXXXX, to the address you gave us. If you do not receive your card by June 16, 2018...

Just got my NOA in the post! (VSC)

Dated 5/29 - odd that I didn't get any notifications via text or email, will log in to see why.

So I hadn't checked my mailbox in a few days because the only letter I was waiting for didn't appear in the USPS Informed Delivery Daily Digest.

Turns out my biometric letter had in fact arrived along with a separate notification that the discrepancy (A# typographical error on I-751) was corrected

Looks like their starting to filter through for us May VSC filers.

5/3/17 (90 days until expiry): I-751 mailed (USPS Priority)

5/6/17: I-751 received at USCIS

5/16/17: USCIS cashed check

5/18/17: 2x copies of I-797 received, with different A#, Receipt#, Receipt times

Despite checking, turns out I made a typo on the I-751 form and provided the wrong A#. It was correctly stated on the cover letter and, of course, the front and back copy of my green card.

The first I-797 references this incorrect A# and has receipt time of 05:32. The second I-797 references the correct A# and has a receipt time of 05:40. I cannot believe I made this mistake! Will be calling them immediately tomorrow just to understand what steps I need to do to correct this, if any 

Hi folks,

Received the texts and emails yesterday, on my one year anniversary in the US. No interview.

On July 28, 2015, we registered your permanent resident status and mailed you a Welcome Notice. Your new permanent resident card should arrive by September 26, 2015.

Good luck to anyone else that is still waiting.

Ideally you'd go for citizenship, right? The pain of all the paperwork is still too fresh to risk losing the GC.

You can get it >3 years. As per eligibility on the N-400 form:

"Have been a permanent resident of the United States for at least 3 years. In addition, you have been married to and living with the same U.S. citizen spouse for the last 3 years and your spouse has been a U.S. citizen for the last 3 years at the time of filing your N-400."

Police check verification will happen "behind the scenes."

Just have your copy on you in case. It was not required during the interview.

Hi guys,

I'm from Sydney and went to my local police station.

When you go to NSW National Police Checks Online, it says this:

"This service allows NSW residents aged 14 years and above to apply online for a National Police Certificate for visa, adoption, employment (including authorisation as an authorised carer), approval as a household member of an authorised carer, some occupational licensing purposes, student placements and for volunteers working in Commonwealth supported aged-care facilities."

"Individuals requiring a criminal record check for Australian citizenship, residency, spouse visa, guardianship of a child from another country, working visa or whilst travelling or living abroad, must apply via the Australian Federal Police (AFP). Details on applying for a criminal record check via the AFP is available at www.afp.gov.au"

I didn't want to take any chances so went ahead with the $175 name, DOB and fingerprint check.

They just scanned my fingerprints (I did not leave with anything besides a receipt) and a week or so later I received the confirmation which I took with me to the consulate just in case. The confirmation will go to the consulate directly.

? What is the date on the letter? I'm very sorry that you got this, it seems to be quite a long wait once we get those!

Date on the letter is December 11 and letter received today, December 15.

Hi VJ'ers,

Just received Potential Interview Waiver Case letter in the mail today.

Almost two months of absolute silence was starting to play on my mind!

Just received the my card was mailed notification, no tracking number though.

If you check your case status online, the number will be there. Simply click on the usps link and it will show the tracking, via Priority Mail.

I just received mine in mail today

Now back onto the job search as the interview I had was awarded to the internal candidate. Would've been too perfect if I landed the job!

Hello friends,

I've just received two glorious emails!!

Application Type: I765 , APPLICATION FOR EMPLOYMENT AUTHORIZATION
Your Case Status: Card/ Document Production

Application Type: I131 , APPLICATION FOR USCIS TRAVEL DOCUMENT
Your Case Status: Post Decision Activity

Now to concentrate and prepare for the 2nd interview I have tomorrow

They seem to be coming in nice and quick at the moment, I had subscribed to both Aug/Sep filer threads.

Good luck to all!

G'day KLS.

I am confused regarding police clearance. So the embassy website says go to WA police and get police clearance from them. I also sent an email to Sydney to check that and they told me to get one from Australian Federal Police, not WA police. They also said to refer to the embassy website, which tells me to contact the WA police.

Which authority did you get your clearance from?

Hi TheBigO,

Go to the local police station in your state. All states carry out the National Police Check (National Criminal History Record Check).

For my K-1 visa, I went to a quieter local police station (Ryde, NSW) and as long as they didn't have someone in custody, they will be able to carry it out for you.

Conflicting information resulted in a preference for the safe route, so I decided to get name, date of birth and fingerprints done ($175) vs. name and date of birth check ($52).

A couple of weeks later I received a hard copy certificate in the post and that same information was provided to the consulate.

Hope that helps.

Yeah we lived together after we got married overseas until April 2013 when I came back to Australia for a 'quick' stay until this visa thing was over. Now still waiting! Ugh I'd better win the lottery to even out my terrible luck for no reason.

Its true. the system is ridiculous. How can people that are married and committed wait longer than people who are dating? AND in most cases (from what I've seen on here, have only met once or twice)

I second what lilsadie said. The system needs to be changed. I know numerous married Australian-American couples who have been waiting a year plus for their visa to move to the States. There's no reason I can see for it to take that long if K-1s are being issued within a few months of application. I mean, I'm super grateful that we got our K-1 so quickly, but applications from married couples need to be processed that quick too.

So excited!!! 15th of July! Its perfect! 1.5/2 months before we hoped to leave so this is PERFECT!!! Once the application is approved we have 6 months to leave AUS don't we? I read somewhere that the visa expires in 4 months?

Its all getting pretty real now!!!

Congrats! I'm not surprised at all that your application moved so fast given your situation.

In answer to your question, the NOA2 expires 4 months from when it is issued, meaning that you need to have your interview within 4 months of receiving the NOA2. Once you have the interview (and assuming you're approved), you will be issued the K-1 visa, so the NOA2 becomes obsolete. Then the K-1 visa is valid for as long as your medical exam results are valid (usually 6 months, unless the beneficiary has a medical condition such as HIV or hepatitis, in which case it's valid for only 3 months*). In other words, if you're relatively healthy, your K-1 visa will be good for 6 months from the date of your medical exam.

*Don't quote me on this. I read this a while ago somewhere on one of the U.S. government websites, and I'm not 100% sure which medical conditions reduce the validity period to 3 months, but it's something along those lines.

Best of luck!

Razspaz >> If you have your case number from the NVC, you can check the status of your case on the U.S. Dept. of State website:

https://ceac.state.gov/CEACStatTracker/Status.aspx?eQs=o/iS8zDpeAKjMWCuebHqOw==

I think when it says "Ready," that means it has arrived at the U.S. Consulate in Sydney.

Crymwest >> As VicAus said, the instructions say to not have the documents in folders / envelopes, so I would advise against putting it in a 3-ring binder. Perhaps you use post-it notes for tabs? That's what I'm doing. (Our interview is this coming Tuesday.) It's a lot of paperwork, especially the evidence the for the I-134, and I want to make it as easy to read as possible.

Hi lilsadie,

Yes, this has changed. You DO NOT need to send anything to the U.S. Consulate prior to your interview. You will receive an email** from the U.S. Consulate with the "Packet 3" information (in our case, the email came to me, the U.S. petitioner). It will 1) have the date and time of the interview you have been assigned, 2) tell you what you need to do if you need to change your interview date/time, and 3) have a list of instructions for what you need to do in preparation for your interview (police check and medical exam) and what you will need to bring to your interview. All of the documents listed in the current Packet 3 are to be brought to the interview (with the exception of the medical exam report, which the doctor sends directly to the U.S. Consulate, and maybe the police check, which depending on the state you live in may also be sent directly to the U.S. Consulate).

**You may have seen my post a week or two ago where I was freaking out because I hadn't received the Packet 3 email. It turns out it had been sitting in my Spam folder for 12 days. So I would advise that you start regularly checking your Spam folder, in addition to your Inbox, once you know that the NVC has sent your application to the U.S. Consulate in Sydney.

The petitioner will receive correspondence from NVC once they have assigned a case number and forwarded it to the US Consulate in Sydney. You don't need to call, but you can if you find it is taking longer than expected to be processed by NVC. (NVC had our petition for less than a week).

I believe only NSW and QLD will require your case number allocated by NVC, as they are the only states that will send the certificate directly to the consulate (so the case number is necessary to match it up with your file). If you are applying through another state, then you can apply for your police certificate at any time.

When you apply for the police check, you will want either a 'name check' or 'name and finger print check'. If you chose the later, you will be required to go to a police station to have your finger prints taken (some do ink, some will scan. If you go through the AFP they will require ink). The police service in your state will then do a check against national databases based on your name (and finger prints if you have that done). They will then send the police certificate you, or the consulate if you are in NSW or QLD. You will not receive a copy of your finger prints.

There is also a service for 'name check and finger prints' which is something different. This means they will provide a certificate based on a name check, and then take your prints and provide you with a copy but not actually do a check on them. This is for those people who also need to apply for a police certificate in other countries and have to supply finger prints taken by an authorised law enforcement agency.

Conducting the actual police check doesn't take very long, but the processing time will vary depending on the workload of the state in which you are applying. So it could be turned around in a week, or it could take up to a month. In our case, it took two months.

Darin&josh, you seem to know a lot on the topic of police checks. I have a question for you...

We live in NSW. My fiance (the beneficiary) did the NSW National Police Check (this one: https://npcoapr.police.nsw.gov.au/aspx/dataentry/Introduction.aspx) and opted for the fingerprint check. In the section where it asks the purpose of the check, he wrote something like Overseas Visa, USA K-1. (There wasn't any space to put the details of exactly who to send it to. It only asked for our personal address.) Then he went and got his fingerprints taken at a local police station. They sent it off to the NSW Criminal Records Section. We thought that because it's NSW, the certificate should go directly to the U.S. Consulate, but yesterday, we received it at our home address. Is this a problem? Did we do something wrong? Will the U.S. Consulate still accept it if we bring it in at the interview? Can we open it? Or should we it in the sealed envelope?

And has anyone else living in NSW been in this situation? If so, how did you go? Did the U.S. Consulate accept your police check (even though it wasn't sent directly from the NSW Criminal Records Section)?

Any advice would be helpful. Thanks!

Sorry for the slow response. Ditto what VicAus said. No need to send anything to the Consulate pre-interview. The Packet 3 letter that I received asked for everything that VicAus listed, and it says to bring all that stuff to the interview.

I (U.S. petitioner) just checked my spam folder and there is was! It's been there 12 days! I feel like such an idiot! Everything else that has been sent to my email has come directly to my inbox, so I didn't even think that it could be in my spam. THANK YOU for the recommendation to check!!!

And FYI to anyone with gmail who is expecting their letter from the U.S. Consulate: CHECK YOUR SPAM!

Hi,

We need some help / advice from those of you who have received an interview date from the U.S. Consulate in Sydney in the last few months.

Here is our situation:

- NVC sent our application to the U.S. Consulate on 18 April

- CEAC visa status check says our application is "READY" (it has said this since 29 April)

- We still haven't heard anything from the U.S. Consulate in Sydney (it is now 9 May)

Questions:

Is this normal to be waiting so long for Packet 3 / interview date?

Do we need to complete form DS-160 before they send us Packet 3 and assign us an interview date?

From everything I have read so far on VJ, I was under the impression that once the NVC sends your application to Sydney, the U.S. Consulate automatically gets in touch with you with the Packet 3 information and your interview date. However, when we hit week 3 after the application was sent from the NVC and still had not heard anything, I started doing more research online. I found these websites stating that you need to complete DS-160 before you will be assigned an interview: http://cdn.ustraveldocs.com/au/au-niv-ds160info.asp and http://travel.state.gov/content/visas/english/forms/ds-160--online-nonimmigrant-visa-application/frequently-asked-questions.html. I know that the DS-160 is used for many different types of visas, so perhaps the K-1 is an exception and we're just being impatient...?

Also, I emailed the U.S. Consulate in Sydney with this question yesterday but have yet to hear back. In the meantime, what were your experiences? Did you complete the DS-160 before you got your interview? Or did you get Packet 3 (with interview date) and then complete the DS-160?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!!

THANK YOU!!

Hi all! I'm a total newbi at all of this!

My partner and I have been living together in Australia for 4 years now and since DOMA we have decided to move to the states. We recently got my partner PR in Aus, but it seems so much easier here than to get the USA visa!

We are going through an attorney in California (Might have been an expensive mistake as it doesn't seem all that necessary really!)

Im just wondering why some peoples K1 takes hundreds of days and some people are approved a lot faster? Or is it just luck of the draw?

Does anyone have any good info, tips to prepare us, etc?

We will be submitting the first part of our application in 2 weeks!!!

1) The biggest variable in the K1 timeline is the amount of time USCIS takes to approve your I-129f petition. As others have said, some service centers seem to process applications faster than others. Unfortunately, you have no control over where which service center your petition gets sent to--it seems to be just luck of the draw. Once your I-129f petition has been approved (i.e. you receive NOA2), the rest of the process for us Aussie-American couples is very straightforward / predictable. The approved application is sent to the National Visa Center, the National Visa Center does their own approval, then they send it to the U.S. Consulate in Sydney, and the U.S. Consulate in Sydney contacts you with an interview date & time.* Based on other Aussie-American couples' timelines, this whole process from NOA2 to interview seems to take about about 60-65 days with minimal variation.

[*the U.S. Consulate in Sydney has recently streamlined their process a bit, so the time between when your application arrives in Sydney and when you have your interview should decrease]

2) If you check out the timeline statistics on this website, you will see that the average processing time at all the service centers has SIGNIFICANTLY decreased in recent months, so now is a good time to apply!

3) Be sure to be very thorough in compiling your I-129f petition and support documentation. If there are any gaps in information or the petition raises questions, you will get a Request for Further Evidence (RFE), and this will delay the processing / approval of your I-129f. USCIS is a real stickler for details (I read somewhere on this website that someone got an RFE for abbreviating Australia with "AU" when writing their address), so it is not uncommon for RFEs to be issued / this is one thing that often delays approval. If your lawyer is any good though, they should take care of all that.

4) From what I have read on this website, Australians seem to get their I-129f petition approved much faster than applicants from many other countries, probably because the fraud risk is so low (quality of life here is pretty sweet--people aren't leaving Australia and going to the U.S. for a better paying job or the social welfare benefits).

5) I also think it helps that the two of you have been living together in Australia for an extended period of time, and that you have a partner visa. My fiance and I have been living in Australia together for 3 years, so when we submitted the I-129f, we were able to provide evidence of that (e.g. lease agreement, photo IDs with identical addresses, etc.). We got approved in 19 days. Plus, having a partner visa shows that you have already successfully proved your relationship (albeit to another government), so it's sort of a no-brainer for USCIS, whose minimum requirement is that you have met in person in the last two years and are committed to getting married within 90 days of arrival in the U.S.

6) As for tips on filing the I-129f...

- Check out the sample forms on this website. There are small details that they clue you into that you may not have thought of otherwise (e.g. writing in all periods of unemployment in addition to employment in the "Applicant's employment last five years" section of the G-325a).

- The more supporting evidence the better.

- Compile the forms and evidence in a way that's super easy to read and understand (I probably used like 30 sticky notes to explain the significance of each piece of evidence and lots of tabs to highlight names, dates, etc.).

- Be very specific with dates and locations when writing the supplemental statement explaining the circumstances under which you met.

- Make sure your lawyer knows what he/she is doing and has your best interests in mind. I've heard stories of people having more trouble with the application going through a lawyer than they would if they had done some research on the web and submitted the application themselves. I don't know if it was because a lawyer's time = money and they wanted more of it, or if these lawyers simply didn't know their stuff. With that said, if you and/or your partner have complicating factors (e.g. a criminal record, previous marriages, previous K-1 applications, children), it may be necessary to consult with a lawyer. I totally get how daunting U.S. immigration is and why you would want a lawyer regardless of your circumstances. I met with an immigration lawyer in Washington DC when I went to a friend's wedding in the States last year because I wanted a professional's input on our options (E-3 vs. K-1) and to make sure we didn't stuff anything up, but even the lawyer said that while he was happy to take our case, he thought our application would be straightforward enough that we could do it on our own.

7) In case it helps, here is what we submitted as "proof of having met in person in the last two years":

- Copies of various travel documents dating back to 2010 (plane tickets / itineraries, bus & train tickets) with both of our names on them indicating that we have travelled together to a bunch of places for holidays. Fortunately, we both have a habit of saving all of our emails, so anything that we had booked online and received a confirmation email for was in a folder in our email accounts somewhere. It was just a matter of printing them out.

- Copies of my Australian visas.

- Copies of all pages of our passports, showing stamps that correspond to the travel documents provided.

- A copy of our lease agreement with both of our names and signatures on it.

- Copies of the front and back of our Australian drivers licenses / photo IDs, showing we have the same address.

- Five color photos of us together (one for each year that we've been together) with names, dates, and locations written on the back. I chose photos taken in a variety of different places, many on the holidays for which we provided travel documents.

- A 3/4 page statement explaining how we met and tying all the pieces of evidence together. It was sort of like a story of the facts of our relationship--met while we were both living in NYC, he moved back to Australia because his U.S. visa expired, I moved to Australia on a Work & Holiday visa to be with him, I got a job and a 457, first we lived together at A, now we live together at B, we went on all these holidays together, etc. I used exact dates and locations for everything so that it was easy to connect the pieces of evidence provided to the story.

In sum, while some of the variation in processing time is due to chance, I think a significant portion of it has to do with factors such as the country the beneficiary is from, whether/not you receive an RFE, your relationship history (whether you've met in person once or have been living together for several years), and personal circumstances that cause USCIS to take more time doing your background checks and confirming your eligibility for the K-1 visa (e.g. criminal history, past marriages, name changes).

One last thing, K-3 visas (the one you apply for if you get married outside the U.S.) take WAY longer than K-1 visas, so don't go get married in New Zealand and then try to move to the U.S. This is evident from the information on VJ, and the lawyer I met with in Washington DC said the same thing. If you want to live in the U.S., get married in the U.S.