festin

41 minutes ago, Ekw said:

Great question! If you go to the mass.gov website and look through the teaching requirements there is an option somewhere on there about obtaining a temporary SSN. I apologize I don’t remember more steps. I just remember my fiancé having to email someone with his intentions then they set it up. Worst comes to worst, you call someone from the education board and ask for assistance. 

 

Once he had the temp SSN # he sent in his collegiate degrees and certificates to the MA education board who then reviewed them and provided the American equivalent degree he had earned. From there he was told what license(s) he was eligible for and was able to study for the MTEL’s he was required to pass for the license. 

 

He was able to take the MTEL’s in South Africa. As long as there’s a Pearson testing center in the country your partner lives in, they can take the tests. The results do take a month to come back. 

 

I hope that that made sense and/or was helpful!!! 

Really helpful

On 1/3/2018 at 8:38 PM, Ekw said:

My fiancé and I have been dabbling with which visa to move forward with. He’s already a licensed teacher in MA and struggling to find a school to sponsor him. He is open to other work to get his here (or to help while he applies for a work permit).

 

he’s also open to finding a job elsewhere in the world. We’re alsp considering going for the spouse visa, however he needs a job in order to get back into his own country or visit the US.

 

any and all leads/advice welcome!

If you don't mind me asking, how did he get Teaching License in MA while outside the US and without SSN?

On 1/9/2018 at 4:43 AM, festin said:

The cost of medical exam is fixed price to $270 and the vaccination cost between $20 to $200 depending on how many shot one has to take.

Immigrant(CR1/IR1) Visa fee which is connected with DS-260 cost $325

Affidavit of Support(AOS) also known as the form I-864 cost $120 and you probably pay in cash at the embassy.

And then after receiving the visa CR1/IR1 you have to pay USCIS Immigrant Fee(Issuance of Green Card and it delivery) cost $220 it's advised to pay it before traveling to the US but you can also pay it after arrival. You can pay it with your card on USCIS website. So nothing more than $1,200 in total.

 

The schedule of interview is up to you, it can be a month away or a week away but you must definitely have your medical exam done before the interview. Is your case number ready for interview appointment?

 

 

Pyridine, we attended the interview on the 23rd of January and status online changed on the 25th to ISSUED and we picked up passport today the 28th.

I will also like to tell you that surprisingly, we were not ask to pay any of the fees(

Immigrant CR1/IR1 Visa fee which is connected with DS-260 cost $325

 and Affidavit of Support I-864 cost $120) i mentioned on my quoted post. We realized after we got out of the Embassy and we went back to ask the embassy staffs they told us all is well and okay. We checked on visajourney and they were people with similar issue. So far all we've paid is $535 for I-130, $390 for vaccinations and $117 for medical exam.

Lastly, on the visa package $220 is states as Immigration Fee to be paid on on USCIS website. 

On 1/18/2018 at 5:32 AM, Tai98 said:

Thank you. My partner and I have been engaged for over a year and planned on doing this private ceremony so I hope just because of the timing they don't let me do dcf etc we have more than enough proof from Facebook timeline to call longs on Skype  leases together in Australia .  My flight here etc . I'm hoping they approve for me to file via consulate as I'll be married by filing time   I understand if partner has to follow a month or two later it's a matter of the fact that atm  this offer is great and current circumstances would lead to very difficult times if we stayed here for another year trying to make it by 

Surprisingly, Ankara asked us for our facebook ID when we filed I-130. So I guess they accept it as a proof of bonafide relationship.

16 minutes ago, pyridine said:

It's strange that it's different but Stockholm instructions explicitly say to first get the medical exam, then send the pre-interview checklist, and then you are scheduled for the interview. I know it's only valid 6 months and is risky considering we don't have all documents yet, but they better not take more than 2-3 months or we'd have other serious problems. His police reports, one of which he already has, are only valid for 3 months. I guess the interview must be scheduled fairly rapidly for them to request it like this. 

 

There's also only one doctor we can use in Denmark as well and they charge $289 for the exam, $100 for a syphilis blood test, they don't even list what it is for the vaccinations but I'm fearful, plus there's a charge at a separate office for the x-ray. Yeah I hear you about the "one off sacrifice". It's just something we gotta do to get him there. We won't consider leaving again until he has citizenship!

Ah! Over here they're charging $270 for the medical exam which includes all the blood tests and x-ray, just the vaccinations cost between min. $20- max. $200 depending on how many one has to take and only the Doctor has the final say to how many one must take. Have you find out how much the vaccination cost min. to max. over there in Denmark?

You don't need to worry about the Police Report as I read somewhere that even though it lasts for 3 months it is valid for the visa for a year. I know this because ours also issued to be valid for just 3 months.

12 minutes ago, pyridine said:

Thanks, that's pretty fast. I'm hoping we'll get a similarly fast date from Stockholm. They ask to check off that he has the medical exam before they will schedule the interview though, but we've been able to make an appointment to get it next week after explaining that. What are you guys doing with varicella vaccination and all that? That's the new chicken pox vaccine and even I don't have it - both of us have already had chicken pox as kids, yet I found info that people of ALL ages need to have it, what a waste. They also say they want flu shot which is dead stupid because it's not like flu isn't gonna come to the US anyway regardless of whether the few people going over on immigrant visas are vaccinated or not. I've never had it and I will travel with him, unvaccinated. I just don't understand the logic sometimes. We'll have to pay for that too since it's not given to just anyone who wants it here. Costs add up more and more...

The law states that the Immigrant visa valid as long as the Medical Exam result is valid and the validity of Medical Exam result is six months which means you must have the visa and enter US within six months from the day the Medical Exam result is issued. So be careful with getting the medical exam done when all required documents for the immigrant visa are not ready. If after getting the medical exam result there is delay with scheduling a visa interview appointment or at the end of the visa interview there's a document missing and it results to AP(Administrative Processing) and along the line the medical exam results expired that mean one has to do(pay) it all over again.

There's only one Physician approved by Ankara to conduct the medical exam and vaccinations. The Physician will decides how many shots one has to take and it varies from minimum of $20 to maximum of $200, additional $270(fixed) for the medical exam. I take it as one off sacrifice of never ending Non-immigrant visa fees one would be paying multiple times of applying to go to the USA.

pyridine, Ankara set interview appointment to January 23. So Medical Exam is booked for January 18. 

48 minutes ago, pyridine said:

Ah ok, they say here that the interview fee is payable at the embassy in Sweden and they accept cash and credit card. Is there another fee you're having trouble with? I'm losing track of all of these...it adds up to a lot. The medical exam is going to cost a damn fortune and my husband needs 4 vaccinations (they require varicella now for all ages?? Ludicrious - I'm not even vaccinated for it and both of us already had chicken pox as kids and are already immune), 3 of which they won't ordinarily give here so he'll have to pay for it at this medical office.

 

I wrote Stockholm asking if it's true that Danish is not OK. Danish is mutually legible to anyone fluent in Swedish anyway. It will cost a fortune if we need all the documents from Denmark also translated. My husband is of course fluent in his home country's language and can do those translations himself. The only ones that we were getting so far were ones from the third country he was living in before that, which has only been a few documents.

Once you've had all the documents in order, how long has the process been to get your interview scheduled? That's something I have no idea about the timeline for. 

The cost of medical exam is fixed price to $270 and the vaccination cost between $20 to $200 depending on how many shot one has to take.

Immigrant(CR1/IR1) Visa fee which is connected with DS-260 cost $325

Affidavit of Support(AOS) also known as the form I-864 cost $120 and you probably pay in cash at the embassy.

And then after receiving the visa CR1/IR1 you have to pay USCIS Immigrant Fee(Issuance of Green Card and it delivery) cost $220 it's advised to pay it before traveling to the US but you can also pay it after arrival. You can pay it with your card on USCIS website. So nothing more than $1,200 in total.

The schedule of interview is up to you, it can be a month away or a week away but you must definitely have your medical exam done before the interview. Is your case number ready for interview appointment?

34 minutes ago, pyridine said:

Hi festin, that's interesting that they didn't request the birth certificate. Actually that document has ended up not being a problem since his mother was agreeable to send it, so it's already in the mail. Now it's the military record that is back to being the main problem document. Were you able to submit documents to Ankara in Turkish or did you need translation to English? For us this is further complicated by our interview not being held in the same country we filed the I-130 in, and the checklist from Stockholm says everything needs to be in English. 

 

The info we got from Stockholm says to file the DS-260 here: https://ceac.state.gov/ceac/. I haven't filed it yet to see how to pay the fee though, but hopefully there will be something online?

Ankara asked that all documents must be in either English or Turkish so they accept all Turkish documents without translations.

DS-260 is free, it's after filling and submitting of it that you will need it confirmation number along with your case number to pay for the Immigrant Visa(CR1/IR1) fee either online by the contractor handling the visa appointments on behalf of the embassy or by cash at the embassy.

I'm glad to hear that birth certificate is out of the way.

We are still waiting for our case number to be available for appointment.

On 1/5/2018 at 3:13 AM, pyridine said:

That's an even faster timeline from Ankara! I technically also had a double exceptional circumstance, since I found out I was pregnant the very day that I accepted the job offer. That got worked into the letter too of course, since might as well use what you've got, but I'm pretty sure the job offer alone would have also worked.

 

Do you have all of your documents ready for the interview so fast? We have a nightmare in that, since my husband has lived in 3 countries and has a son living in one of them (for which we apparently need an original birth certificate, even though he is not coming with us and lives with his mother, and the mother will undoubtedly never agree to send us her original because she'd rightfully wonder why the hell do we need that), and did mandatory military service in his home country...just a ton of stuff to obtain from so many places.  Not to mention all the translations. Since we have to go to Sweden for the interview, I'm not sure if they'll accept documents in Danish like the embassy here would. This is gonna cost a damn fortune.

Yes we've been arranging document to file through Chicago Lockbox before Job Offer and Pregnancy. 

Surprisingly, we have another thing in common. That is, my husband has a son too that's not coming with us at least not within 6 months after we move, we will have to file I-130 for him in the future but not anytime soon. But Ankara did not request for his Birth certificate(not even a copy).

We are still waiting on how to make payment for DS-260 so that we can proceed with the medical exam and visa interview. Ankara says it's not in their hand but in the hands of their contractor called GSS, who are in charge of scheduling appointments, visa fees, and courier services( visa application document delivery).

We have a similar case too, our exceptional circumstances fall under Job Offer and Pregnancy .

Dec. 19, 2017 ~ we emailed US Embassy in Ankara.

Dec. 21, 2017 ~ Embassy emailed us that USCIS in Athens approved our request. Booked December 28 for filing of I-130.

Dec. 28, 2017 ~ We filed I-130 at the Embassy in Ankara.

Jan.  2, 2017 ~ I-130 was approved! Consulate in Ankara emailed us case number, checklist of documents and instruction about IR-1 visa interview. 

Now we are waiting for appointment date for IR-1 Visa Interview.

15 hours ago, cyanmavi said:

Yeah it takes three weeks or so for regular mail from Turkey to arrive in the US. Does the check have your name and address on it? USCIS likes personal checks to have that information on them. I didn't have checks in my name at the time of filing so I got money orders.

The checks coming from the US(BOA) to Turkey not other way round. Yes it's personal check linked to my checking account.

9 hours ago, cyanmavi said:

TEB has an agreement with Bank of America, I can use Bank of America ATMs in the US to withdraw money from my TEB Bank account. You can ask them.

Actually, I have BOA account too and I've noticed that never been charged for ATM withdrawal transactions. Also I spoke with a TEB customer care she said i would have to contact BOA. I ordered my check with BOA to be delivered to me in Turkey but it's gonna take a month at least, with no tracking number shipment.

2 minutes ago, ColoradoBeauty said:

You're right, PurplePassion ended up asking a friend in the US

 

 

Thank you very much.

1 hour ago, ColoradoBeauty said:

You won't know unless you give it a try and ask.

On 11/18/2014 at 4:15 PM, PurplePassion said:

our package was sent back to us and said return due to incorrect amount or no check. We sent the money with PTT western union money order with correct amount in usd.... I do not konw how im going to send the money to us from turkey. I have a very old bank account I barely used in usa. Would I still be able to contact that bank and do it? Its been years since I even touched that account.

Everyone I seen sends a check from bank accuont or family sends tehm money order which I do not have any trust worthy family within statess.

cant i just send it through my spouse turkish bank account?

1 hour ago, truelove29 said:

Do you have anyone in the U.S. that can write a check for you? You can send your petition packet to them & have them include the check & mail it for you.

No, i don't have anyone. Thank you.

28 minutes ago, broppy said:

 

 

 So? Pay by cheque or money order.

It has to be in US$ and I don't know any bank that issues that here in Turkey.

1 minute ago, geowrian said:

You cannot pay for an I-130 via credit card.

 

You can pay via check or money order drawn on a US financial institution.

See: https://www.uscis.gov/forms/paying-uscis-fees

credit card payment on that link is not for I-130

1 hour ago, broppy said:

https://www.uscis.gov/forms/paying-uscis-fees

 

You can pay by cheque or money order drawn on a US bank. If you don't have a US chequing account, have a friend or relative write one for you.

I'm currently in Turkey.

Just now, JEANIEW said:

you can use a credit card

How? Can you please share the link?

1 hour ago, ColoradoBeauty said:

International money order or cashier's check linked to a US bank. Ask for an international money order payable/denominated in US dollars in the US.

I'm currently in Turkey.

Hi All,

Please i would like to know if anyone knows the method of payment for filing I-130(outside of USA) from Turkey?

Thanks all.