Meghan&Andrey

Thank you guys! Will do. I appreciate your responses. 

27 minutes ago, NuestraUnion said:

DO NOT LET HIM LEAVE THE COUNTRY.

 

When you filed for AOS the first time did you also file for EAD/AP? Is it expired now or did you just not file one?

 

You need to file a new AOS as soon as you can.

Yes he still has his EAS/AP but we assumed that was voided when his petition was denied? Are we supposed to file the AOS and not a new petition for already being married?

Yes he still has his EAS/AP but we assumed that was voided when his petition was denied? Are we supposed to file the AOS and not a new petition for already being married?

I'm not sure where this goes so forgive me if this isn't the right location. It's been a long time since I've been active on here. My husband came from Russia on a K1 visa in 2015 & we were married in March of 2015. We filed his AOS right away. We had a baby in February of 2016 & shortly thereafter got the interview notice. Our entire house had the flu so I called to see about rescheduling his interview. They guy said it was good we called because if we had shown up sick they would have sent us home anyway. A few weeks later we receive a letter saying his petition was denied because he did not appear at the interview. You only have 30 days to appeal & the form was $600+. We decided we would just wait & file again when we could come up with the money. Now it's 2017 & we are ready to file again but there's issues. Are we still supposed to file the same AOS that we did before? Do we need to start a new petition as a married couple rather than adjust from the K1? It's been a year since he was denied. Will he not be able to leave the country until he gets his green card? We're afraid of the 3-10 year ban. I've tried getting a consult with the attorney in my town but he won't return my messages so I really don't know what to do. We just found out we're expecting again so I really need to get my husband legal so he can work. 

Two calls into the customer service & it appears it will finally be resolved. The first time I called the woman was transferring me to an immigration officer. I put in to be called back since the wait was said to be 29 minutes. Over an hour later & no call back so I called customer service again. She was nice & put in a service request for me but that was all she said she or anyone could do. Almost 2 hours later I finally get the call back from the immigration officer. After I explained what happened he pulled up our file & said it clearly shows you called the day before but there must have been a time delay in relaying information so it didn't get to the field office in time for them to know you called to reschedule. He said just give us some time to process & it will work out. You should receive a letter on or before April 10th so just give us some time. I asked if he was sure I would get one on or before April 10th because my other option is having to file that form for a motion to reopen the case & the fee for that is over $600 for something I didn't do..he said no no don't do that don't do that. Just wait for the letter. So..we're waiting for the letter. I have cried so much over this! It's awful..

Take the confirmation number to an infopass as proof that you did reschedule. If they don't want to re open the case consult an attorney.

Try to speak to tier 2 and not just any receptionist.

Thank you! I was planning to call tomorrow but I wasn't sure what number to call. I'm afraid to make the infopass because his denial says he needs to leave the country ASAP. I'm afraid showing up will get him in trouble even though this is all a huge mistake.

My husband had his AOS from k-1 interview on March 17th. On March 16th I called the number on the interview letter to reschedule because my entire house had the flu. The guy told me it was good I called because if we had gone to the interview sick then they would have just sent us home anyway. He said they would reschedule & I got a confirmation number from him. I didn't hear anything else until today. My husband got a letter saying because he missed his interview, his I-485 application has been denied & he needs to leave the country. I'm so confused. What do we do? We supposedly successfully rescheduled by phone but apparently they don't have record of that? I feel like I majorly screwed up my husband's immigration stuff but we all had the flu & there was no choice. Does anyone know what I should do now?

Oh I'm sorry. I thought I had posted in the right place.

Can anyone provide some insight into when they mail the letter?

No, I used uscis.gov and it says:

"Case Is Ready To Be Scheduled For An Interview

As of November 30, 2015, we are ready to schedule your Form I-485, Application to Register Permanent Residence or to Adjust Status, Receipt Number MSC**********, for an interview. We will schedule your interview and send you a notice. Please follow any instructions in the notice. If you move, go to www.uscis.gov/addresschange to give us your new mailing address."

Last month (December) I randomly decided to check our case status for our AOS from K1 and it said that on November 30th they mailed a letter with an interview date & time. It was around a month after that date & we had never received the letter. So I went online & did one of the infopass things (I guess thats what it's called) for a letter that was not received & they said I would receive a response by January 22nd. That's today & still no letter or any response. Is there a gap between a status change & when they actually mail the letter for the interview? I know the letter will predate the interview by 6 weeks so if there isn't anything available for a while could that be why we haven't gotten a letter? Our biggest issue is I am 9 months pregnant & will be having our baby in the next 3 weeks. We obviously need the interview to be well after that. Also, I didn't send the medical form with my husband's AOS paperwork because I knew he needed vaccinations. I was going to wait for the RFE & get it all done then. We never got a RFE. So I don't know if that's something we will also need to do before the interview or not.

Hmmmmmm...ok. Thank y'all for the feedback. I have already read the Moscow embassy Fiance visa page about 10 times. At least. So I am familiar with that. My issue is getting TO that point. I called the NVC today and they told me that my petition was in administrative processing (AP). It arrived on May 8th, which is last Friday, so really it's been there only two days. I got a case number that begins with MOS2015, which I presume means Moscow in the year 2015. I must have blew a gasket internally when I heard the AP thing however; that is because I don't wanna get caught in the dreaded AP sinkhole! I immediately asked if that was normal or if it had something to do with my specific petition. The lady from the NVC said it was normal. Then I seem to recall seeing somewhere on VJ that ALL Russian K1 petitions are placed into AP when they arrive at the NVC. So I have a few questions:

1) Is it true that all Russian K1s are put into AP automatically? Is it because of the conflict in Ukraine?

2) How long do they typically remain in AP? And before going to the embassy?

3) How long was YOUR petition in the NVC altogether and was it placed into AP also?

4) Meghan, when you say that you continued to check the status each day, which status? CEAC or USCIS case status? (I'd think CEAC, but I'm not sure)

5) Did either or both of you attend the interview at the embassy with your fiance? I am planning on doing this.

6) Meghan, when you saw the Ready status and then scheduled the interview, how did you schedule it? Online? By phone? And how far out into the future was the interview appointment date from when you scheduled that interview date? One week? One month? I saw on Igor's list that the average wait time for a K1 visa at the Moscow embassy was 31 days. Is that accurate?

7) How long did it take for your petition to arrive at the embassy in Moscow from the NVC? (in-transit time) I've heard that they overnight it, to some countries anyway. Don't know if that includes Russia.

Ok thank you for the help! I am trying to stay on top of all of this because we just had our son in hospital 32 in Moscow on 4/22. Did the CRBA successfully on May 7th. And I need to get this interview done ASAP so that we can all go home together before my vacation time from work expires.

I included the link to the embassy page to show you that despite what others have said, you do not send the embassy anything. You take it with you to the interview.

Ours was never in AP any of the time I checked it. Which was pretty much from as soon as the embassy had it. So no, ours did not go into AP and no, most Russian cases do not go into AP.

I don't remember how long it took. I just kept calling until they received our file & then kept checking CEAC until his status shad updated to Ready. Then scheduled the interview online. You pay the fee, get a code, go to another site & log in & schedule it. But it seems that USCIS waits until they have a pile of cases to go to Russia before they send them off. So it could be a little while. I want to say it took ours like 2 weeks to get from NOA2 to the embassy.

I want to say that the closest interview was between 2-4 weeks away. We chose to have ours later because I needed to wait until the Christmas break to be able to attend. Which I did. Spent a month in Russia.

I don't remember a lot of it because that was back in September and A LOT has happened since then. I thought I put the important stuff in my signature but it seems I left stuff out.

I did a little more research as did my husband. He said that in the eyes of Russia, we are a Russian family. He is still a full Russian citizen. So, we would be able to adopt. However, I think that we would have to do the living with the child in Russia for the two years before we could immigrate him/her. I don't know how living in Russia for that long would work with my husband's immigration status. Well, it wouldn't work. So I guess if we get to our last resort, we would have to just go live in Russia.

We never got an email and never sent anything in. I called & got the case number & then just checked the status once a day until it said ready. Then scheduled the interview. There are specific instructions on the embassy website that tells you what to bring to your interview. THAT is when you give copies of passport, confirmation letter is to get in, etc.

http://moscow.usembassy.gov/iv-fiancee.html

I'm not sure if this is the right place to ask but this is Russia-specific. My husband and I are wanting to adopt. We would really love to adopt from Russia. Since I'm American, I obviously cannot do that. But does anyone happen to know anything about it being allowed if one spouse is a Russian citizen? Or if that isn't allowed, maybe my husband can adopt & then what..we have to go through another immigration process to get the child here then I can adop him/her? This is so complicated. We are planning to adopt one or two American children that are older. But infants are nearly impossible to adopt here without a huge amount of money. That's why we would like to adopt from Russia plus having ties to my husband's homeland.

It's so crazy how similar our situations are! I forgot to comment on the employment part too. Andrey had two jobs in Sochi for the last few years because his house is in Abkhazia (close to Sochi, across the border). He had one official job & one job off the books. We listed them both with no issues. He is registered in Izhevsk but that is hundreds of miles away. Really far. They never questioned the Izhevsk registration & Sochi employment history. Our interview seemed to be a little out of the norm in that the man was more concerned with our trip to Turkey where we met & verifying THOSE details rather than details of our relationship or where he was from/worked. He did ask what type of work he was in to I guess compare that to the paperwork to make sure. Even asked what his typical duties were. I know you're doing this in Ukraine and ours was Russia but they have to be pretty darn similar. Don't base your expectations of your interview off of his but maybe brush up on that stuff a little before you go, I would suggest. Also, unless it's a huge mistake you've made in the paperwork, I would highly suggest not trying to fix anything unless they bring it up. If it isn't important enough to them to mention it or ask about it, don't worry about it!

We had the same problem with my Russian husband's registration address & where he actually lived, which was Abkhazia. America doesn't even recognize Abkhazia as a country or anything so we didn't know what to do. Someone on here said you put exactly what it says in their internal passport for registration because that's the only thing they actually have a record of. That registration address should be the only thing they could find in any system so that's what we did. We had zero issues. He's now here in the US, we're married & going through AOS.

He needs one in a series for MMR, Tdap/TD, varicella(unless you already had chickenpox), and flu shot(only during flu season/Oct. - Mar.). http://www.cdc.gov/immigrantrefugeehealth/exams/ti/civil/vaccination-civil-technical-instructions.html#tbl1

You will need to find a civil surgeon in the US that will not insist on a new medical and do the vaccinations only for you.

You might be able to find a civil surgeon in this thread > http://www.visajourney.com/forums/topic/231026-civil-surgeons-who-dont-rip-you-off/page-13

Thank you very much! I will find one & get him in ASAP.

Did he have the vaccinations before or at the K-1 medical? In that case the original DS-3025 is in with his other documents turned in at his POE. There is info at the bottom of that post about not having a copy of the DS-3025.

If he did not receive the required vaccinations before or at the K-1 for them to be marked off on the DS-3025, then he needs to see a civil surgeon.

He didn't receive any at the medical exam in Moscow. He says he asked her what he was missing, if any, and she just kept saying that he didn't have to worry about getting any until he was getting his citizenship "a long time from now." I'm guessing he's missing a few in his medical book because even he said they didn't always write them down & it's impossible to get any info from the school(s) he would have gotten them at.

Civil surgeon. I-693.

OP, see this post > http://www.visajourney.com/forums/topic/428381-i-693-report-of-medical-examination-and-vaccination-report/?p=6206232

I've read that but he wasn't given the DS-3025. So it isn't a matter of it being insufficient or incomplete, it just doesn't exist.

I thought I had done all my research before his interview but that was something I missed. Thank y'all. I guess I need to figure out some way to translate the vaccinations from his medical book to know for sure what he has (since I doubt anyone around here reads Russian) then the doc can eliminate the age exemptions & go from there. Thank y'all!

Andrey & I were just married and I just got our marriage license back. Now I'm about to send off this paperwork but the I-485 instructions state "you only need to submit the vaccination supplement, not the entire medical report. You may include the vaccination supplement with your Form I-485."
Andrey was never given anything, no DS-3025 or anything else that wasn't in the sealed envelope. Even though I urged him to get any vaccinations he thought he was missing in Russia rather than wait until he came here, he never went to a doctor to see if he was missing any & when he went to his exam, they never flat out told him that he was missing any. He says the girl just kept saying "You don't have to get any until you get your citizenship a long time from now." when he would ask.

What do we do? Do I just send in everything else and wait for a RFE? I've read where some sent in a letter stating they never got any documentation for vaccinations because everything was in the sealed envelope and they never got a RFE. Do I need to take him somewhere and go through this stupid vaccination process again? These vaccinations are like $100 a piece and that really adds up.

I honestly thought we were being denied. Our interviewer was a lot more of an interrogator than I thought. Andrey was extremely nervous & scared of being denied so he wouldn't speak loud enough for the man to hear & he couldn't think straight to answer the questions properly. The questions weren't what I was expecting & focused on how we met (by chance online in a bingo app chat) and our trip to Turkey this past March. They were pretty simple questions but it was like they were trying to find holes in our story & we were thrown off guard. We hadn't went over those details because we really didn't think it would be brought up. He never asked for more proof of our relationship except he asked if we had more pictures & I said I didn't bring any since we submitted the ones from Turkey already.He was typing a lot & at the end was quiet for longer than before so I just knew that when he reached over & got a paper to hand to us, it was a denial. Much to my surprise, he casually said "your visa is approved" and was explaining what the sheet said. We both were just shocked & it took a second before we realized he had just said we were approved & it was over.

As for airlines & POE, we're flying Turkish Airlines into Houston in mid-January. They were the cheapest we could find & our two tickets add up to the average cost of one.

I feel like I missed something you wanted to know so anything else, just ask (:

I am so happy to be able to say the hardest part is over & we get to be together for the rest of the process & the rest of our lives! Thank you to all of you who have answered my many questions (;

Thank you! We're looking at flying back together January 13th with a December 17th interview date so that should hopefully be enough time. Just wanted to make sure. We also have the holidays messing with our timeline because of Christmas & New Years.

Can anyone tell me about how long it took after your interview (or your spouse's interview) before he/she received their visa? Im flying to Moscow next weekend to attend my fiancé's interview with him. I don't have a return ticket because we want to fly back together. We have family to visit & stuff but I would really like to know how long we're looking at here.