Clair.S

Wow, its been two years since I was on this site I have my biometrics appointment in SLC on 06/03.

Thanks everyone! This is a work from home position, I am currently pregnant so just wanted something where I could earn some money before the baby arrived. I need to call them next week. Ive been told it has been sorted and I need to call them next week as they seem to need to go over my I-9 and some other things. Its a shame, this company is providing staffing to probably one of the biggest companies in the USA and the world.

LOL because they're always right, and if you want a job you will not complain.

Technically their policy can not overrule Federal law, but it happens every day because the HR departments never bother to read the actual instructions on the form they're required to fill out for every employee.

Did you point out the part of the form that states it is illegal for them to tell an employee what form of identification they will accept?

This has all been done through email, so I forwarded our email correspondence to the Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices and they are kindly dealing with it :-) *Edit - Including the bit where they told me which I.D document I had to submit for the I-9 ;-)

After further communication....They are now trying to claim that this will not affect my start date. My enrollment is just 'postponed' (which obviously has the knock on affect of postponing any start date). They are still stating that its their policy to have the front and back of the permanent resident card, so I will just have to wait. They also stated that they have worked on many projects and this has never been an issue.

So even though I sent them all the information my enrollment is still being postponed until they get the full copy of my permanent resident card. As according to them, they have done this many times before without any issues.

Thanks !

I rang the Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices, they were very helpful and said pretty much what you said, and that they can't move my start date to get the hard copy when I already have a valid visa.

Hi,

I've paid my fee and I'm currently waiting for my Permanent Resident Card to be sent. I have my temporary permanent resident stamp in my passport but my potential employer who I have a job offer from are saying that I won't be able to be employed until I get the actual Permanent Resident Card as they require a photocopy of the front and back of it. This seems very unfair, is there anything I can do about this?

Thanks

Pay after you arrive. Work on your move this weekend.

Thanks Nich-Nick, I just had a panic attack when it said on the form that it must be paid before travel :-)

Due to fly out on monday and I'm trying to pay my $165 fee prior to entry. So I was almost finished setting up my account, typed in the security pin number they sent me via email and red letters came on the screen with a system error warning, my account had been locked and that I had to call USCIS to unlock it. The line I have to call is only open Monday to Friday... Any advice to a poor lady who thinks her head is about to explode?

...Going to go sob in the corner.

My wife's interview letter does not have +1 on there, and we did include me on the applicant readiness form. I will definitely ask about including me and as far as my being present at the window with her - they can always just ask me to go and sit down. Thanks for the info.

I think experiences can be different depending on the staff member working at each window - In our case my husband (the petitioner) did most of the talking. The staff were asking him about what state he was from and the gentleman from the first window was also from the same state so they talked about that a bit and where we would be moving too. The gentleman from the second window was also interested in where my husband was from and they were comparing the weather and things in their home states and the outdoor recreation in Utah where we will be moving to.

I can completely co-sign this! Exact same experience for me yesterday in London. All in all around 2.5 hours at the embassy, all went very smoothly and relaxed - I wasn't asked many questions and received very friendly responses during both the 1st window document collection and 2nd window interview phases. Like you say, the interview was basically just a general chat, very short for me, my fianceé didn't even have time to get out from the restroom before I was done! Few minutes at max.

I was told at the end "you'll have a great story to tell your kids, I'm requesting an approval for your visa, you're all set!"

Very happy. Just awaiting my "ready" status to update to "issued" via the CEAC site now.

Cheers and good luck to all in the earlier stages. I'll write up my full interview experience including the docs I submitted shortly.

Congratulations!! Hope it gets issued soon for you :-)

It's good to get this information from someone with a fresh memory of what and how it works. Some people tend to give information here that is simply inaccurate. So, if I'm understanding this correctly, we should not try to go and see the security guard at the gate, but rather go and join the end of the line right away, right?

The staff outside are all British. Like I said before its a bit chaotic, you walk up towards the embassy and there are these queues with no labels or signs to say who should go where, so you have to ask one of the staff which queue you need to be in. Everyone is asked to get their appointment letters and passports out, the staff members then walk up and down the lines checking your letters and make sure you are in the right line and have a plastic security bag to put your electronics in :-)

Mine was issued on tuesday and I received my email today to say that it will be ready for collection tomorrow.

Good to know. I might have to write them so I don't end up standing outside I also heard that those who are in line (queue) for CR-1/IR-1 will be placed in a separate line and go in first. I plan to ask them at the gate just to make sure I'm not standing there longer than I have to.

From my experience CR-1/IR-1 do not go in a separate line and do not go in first. The queue outside the embassy is a bit chaotic and is done by time of appointment for two of the lines and the other line is for those who have checked in to go through security. So when you finally get to the front of your timeslot line and sign in for your appointment, you then join the line to go through security (they only let 4 people in at a time). When you get in the embassy tickets are based on what type of visa you are applying for be it immigrant or non-immigrant, my number was i918. These tickets are not called in order, by the looks of it 3 or 4 of the desks were dealing with immigrant visas. There were significantly more non-immigrant visa applicants during my visit than immigrant applicants, as such the wait for immigrant applicants didn't seem that long at all

Why do you have to pick up your visa? I thought that when you scheduled your courier (prior to interview day) it will be delivered to you. I started to read everything again so I don't miss anything. When you get anxious you tend to forget things. They scheduled wife's interview at 8am. I was hoping it was going to be more like 9:30, but I will most likely get a hotel near by instead of getting up at 4am. I'm curious, because wife's appointment letter, does not have my name on it anywhere and I included myself in the readiness form to be present.

When you schedule the courier you have a choice of pick up or delivery, the depot is less than 3 miles away from where I'm staying so didn't bother with delivery :-) I would say its best to get a hotel, we were up at 4.00 to make my 8.30 appointment and still had to rush. They do the queue's by timeslot e.g 8-9am and 9am+ So I would still suggest getting there 30+ minutes early. There is some good restaurants near by on Duke Street I think for breakfast celebrations afterwards ;-) You must take your appointment letter with you as you will need it when you are queuing outside the embassy. I also placed my husbands name on the readiness form but my husbands name wasn't on my appointment letter so I used the online enquiry form to request to be added to the list and they responded and added him to the list.

Not that it probably matters to you Clair but I thought I'd give you a little quick update: our interview letter came in this morning. The interview was scheduled for the first week of August, so I'm glad. The last stage has began.

What wonderful news! I'm glad that it has finally arrived! I received my courier email today and am able to pick up my visa tomorrow, So excited that I can now book my flights!

The ceac.state.gov/ceacstattracker website has "READY" status as of July 9th on it. No other information is given. I'm not sure if it actually changes to something like "interview scheduled" or not. Maybe you're right. If they reply, and I hope they do, I will at least find out whether or not the readiness form was received. Thanks. So are you ready for the big move? I've been living in Europe for the last few years and I know it's going to be a headache trying to pick the things we want to take with us. Most of my things were "acquired" by my sister when I left and it will be hard to get them back now

I went by CEAC date changes to know when my medical results were received etc. I don't think it changed from "READY" just the date changed when they sent the letter out. Out household goods were shipped in June, it took me about a month to sort out the house , so we were down to our suitcases which was a pain. We had been staying at a hotel for a few days and finalised our release from our rental house today so we are almost there. We are shipping two dogs so that is a bit of a hassle. My husbands also traveling alone, so is having to take the two dogs plus 3 suitcases!

Thank you for replying. So it looks like the Embassy assigned your interview date a week after your medical. That's quite fast, for I have heard of two weeks and more. My wife's medical was on July 3rd and Applicant Readiness Form was sent even earlier. However, they will not do anything until they receive the medical results. It's only been two weeks (almost), so I shouldn't worry, but it is the uncertainty of knowing whether or not our Readiness Form has gone through or not. I'm surprised the Embassy replied to your e-mail. They have a statement on their website that if it hasn't been 6 weeks from your medical, you will not even get a response about the interview date. Maybe I should wait until next Monday, then ask them whether the interview date has been assigned or not. I don't have military orders, but I did put down (on the readiness form) the date we're planning on arriving in the U.S. - which is the 25th of August.

My medical results were received by the embassy on 23rd June so it was a very fast turn around as the interview letter was dated the 25th June.

Its worth asking through the online enquiry system, the worst that could happen is that they don't respond, so you don't really loose anything by asking :-)

Congratulations! Being professional - following strict procedures does not have to equal to being obnoxious, and people who work at the U.S. Embassy in London form the epitome of what professionalism should be all about I cannot give my opinion on the experience just yet for my wife is still waiting for her interview day, but I have read a lot of reviews on people's day at the interview.

Just curious, how long after your medical have you received your interview letter?

The staff at the embassy were really nice and friendly :-)

My medical was on 18th June and my interview letter is dated as being sent on the 25th June. On my readiness form I stated that my husband is leaving the UK this week, so not sure if that and that he is military may have hurried things along. I did use the online form to contact the embassy on the 25th June to see if I had an interview date yet and they replied the next day.

It might also be worth adding that there were a lot less CR1 applicants at the embassy and the queue for us was much shorter.

Congratulations Claire.

It was probably way easier than you imagined it, right?

Yes! We spent more time in queue's than we did doing the actual interviews. The visa has already been issued, so hopefully it won't be too long now :-)

Today was interview day, all in all it took about 2.5 hours. What surprised me though was at the interview they didn't ask me any questions about our marriage, just a general chat about Utah (where we are moving to).

I had my interview today, they wanted copies and I got all my originals back apart from my police certificate.

Virgin are a good airline but they need to take their thumb out of a particular body cavity and stop punishing clients who book one way flights. The 80s called. They want their round trip special fares back. You also need to be careful not to accidentally book yourself on a Delta flight now that they list those on their website.

Yes! I was heartbroken when I found my flight London to Salt Lake City was around 500 pounds as part of a return, yet to do it as a one way flight costs over 1k :-(

I'd be surprised if you don't hear anything by Wednesday. My visa was ready to pick up the very next day after I'd received the email with the tracking number. That said, I picked it up from a London depot, so it didn't travel far.

I've also been looking at flights. I still have a few things to tie up before I can book my tickets. Currently, it's a toss up between Air New Zealand and Virgin Atlantic. If I can help it, I don't want to ever have to do the two-layover trips again - would rather pay more for a direct flight to LAX.

I've never travelled Air New Zealand, but I've always really enjoyed my flights with Virgin Atlantic

I was asked by a friend to take them to the embassy a few weeks ago. I looked into the prices of parking and all the added extras of driving in London and decided it wasn't financially worth it, so we parked in Harlow and got the train in (7 pound a day parking at the train station). A few things to consider, this is your interview, if you are stressed like I would be...would you:

-Want to drive in London during rush hour when you have an early appointment.

- Want to find parking around the embassy, which from my observations seemed very limited.

I would say either stay in a hotel overnight or drive early but park at one of the outer train stations and get the train / tube in - but again have enough time spare for any delays.

As for getting there after 8.30, it does state on your interview letter that "Late arrivals may result in cancellation of your appointment". Whilst they don't run appointments by the exact time specified, this isn't something that I would want to test for something so important.