klems10024

9 minutes ago, harry.st said:

 

3 hours in NYC? I did it last summer... I cannot imagine how it would be possible (I am not saying they were rushing things, but it was clear nobody wanted to waste time either).

 

Do you care to share what happened? Did you take the ceremony-in-a-courthouse option (I heard that is longish).

Yeah it was at a courthouse. My invitation was at 9am, and there were a LOT of people. 160 folks were getting their naturalization. They dont start anything until everyone is there, so nothing really started until 9:45am or so. Then they check everyone in individually, take your green card, then you line again to sign your certificate of naturalization. Then you sit again, you wait some more, the judge comes to do a speech, and then you wait for your turn to be called to get your certificate. I was out around noon. I'm not really sure why we had to wait for everyone to have arrived so they could start processing. 

Quick update: I had my oath ceremony this morning (took almost 3 hours!), and I had snagged an appointment at the passport agency this afternoon. I was in and out in 10 minutes, I showed my proof of travel and they told me my passport will be ready on Tuesday! So it all worked out ! Appreciate everyone's advice! 

1 hour ago, Crazy Cat said:

A Certificate of Naturalization is not a valid travel document.  

Don’t travel without your U.S. Passport - U.S. Embassy in the Dominican Republic (usembassy.gov)

 

"While dual citizens may be able to travel abroad with alternative documentation, all U.S. citizens are required to present a U.S. passport in order to re-enter the United States. We have increasingly seen a number of individuals who recently obtained U.S. citizenship travel outside the country with only their naturalization certificate and/or passport of another nationality and be turned away when attempting to reenter the U.S."

But the thing is that the US cannot refuse entry to their own citizens. Although it is really not recommended to do so (and technically illegal, although it doesn't seem like a lot of fines are issued for that), it is still possible to enter via a land border with a certificate of naturalization - but you will be sent to secondary inspection and it can take hours. It's completely impossible by air travel though, since the airline won't even let you board the plane. 

3 hours ago, Ricky+Vanessa said:

Why not delay the oath ceremony until you get back? 

 

At my ceremony, in Saturday hust gone, the officiant even said you plan to travel rebook your oath ceremony and travel with your green card. 

 

Alternatively check how often your local office does the oath ceremony a d try and get in sooner. Mine seemed to do multiple ceremonies that day (I did same day ceremony). And then try getting an appointment for quick turnaround passport. 

 

Delaying the oath makes the most sense though. I'm just not seeing the point of travelling with the certificate on chance. 

Well I did secure the passport appointment just after my ceremony and I will have proof of international travel for a few days later so it should work just fine. Traveling with the naturalization certificate is the worst case scenario if for whatever reason they refuse, or cannot print my passport within the few days I have. But absolutely everyone I know or talked to who needed a passport immediately because of international travel, managed to have it done same day (or the day after). 

And the reason I prefer trying to do that is because I have to travel often. I have more international travel planned a few weeks after, so if I delay the oath ceremony the likelihood of finding myself in a similar situation again is high. It seems like normal processing times for a new passport can be well over a month, if not 2, and given my job this is impossible for me to wait this long. 

Well I got online just after midnight today as I figured that's when passport office appointments would open for the day of my ceremony, and had no issues getting one! My ceremony is at 9am, I read somewhere it can last up to 3 hours, so I booked an appointment at 2:30pm on the same day. At least one part is secured  !

Great, thank you so much!! Looks like as long as I'm able to secure an appt I should be able to pull this out. 

6 minutes ago, Amunah said:

What state are you in? Here in New York we have few offices that process passports in 24hours. I managed to get my passport in a day. Also for my then seven year old, since she had a baby picture in her passport😁

I'm in NYC! Did you go to the main office ?.

4 hours ago, harry.st said:

No, I do not think you need to do that.

 

I think you can take the train AT Toronto/Montreal. I "seem to remember reading" that for immigration purposes, you get checked at the station in Toronto/Montreal before you board the train - ie not at the border (this is certainly the case at the Toronto airport, btw). This would be waaay more convenient than going, say, by bus, to the border, entering + then hopping on a train (but again, they may deny you boarding, just like an airline. And tell you "dude, go to the border + fight it out there").

 

But I am not 100% sure (I did not have this problem, so did not investigate in depth). I would call them!

From doing the train ride from Montreal to NYC years ago, I remember we stopped at the border for quite some time and Border control inspected everyone's documents, we were stopped for a couple of hours. Honestly as long as I can cross a land border with the certificate, that solves my problem!

2 minutes ago, fred16384 said:

I had no problem scheduling an appointment at my local Passport Agency for an urgent upcoming trip using their online tool. There was actually plenty of availability.

The tool is at http://passportappointment.travel.state.gov

Yeah, I'm going to start monitoring every day to see when dates open so I can grab a slot maybe the afternoon of my ceremony or the following Monday! 

@harry.st yeah, that's the plan. I'm fully expecting not to be able to board the plane with just the naturalization cert, and won't even try to do so. I also won't be able to do anything where I'm going to (Peru) and getting a passport there, I'm on the ground for a mere 48 hours and will have zero time for anything. So basically before I leave, if I don't have my US passport in hand, I will just exit with my French passport, and get cheap plane ticket from Lima back to Toronto and enter at Niagara Falls, or Montreal and take the train back indeed (which I've also done before!). I'm confident I'll be able to get an appointment for my passport even if I have to travel somewhere to do it, so that would really be the worst case scenario! 

Once again appreciate the tips here  .

Thank you all! I managed to also discuss with other people, and the consensus is to basically get an appointment as soon as the window opens on the schedule so I can lock in a date (even if I'm securing the appt before the ceremony - it seems easy enough to do online). 

My naturalization is on (Friday) Feb 2nd, and my travel is on Feb 9th, so I essentially need to have a passport by Feb 8th. If I can secure a slot that same Friday in the afternoon or even Monday, and show a printout of my itinerary, they will be able to make it happen. Some other folks suggested other hacks that are probably not best mentioned here but that gives me hope. 

Also thanks @harry.st - this is a very, very useful tip. I'm thinking that if for whatever reason I can't get my passport in my short window, I can still go, change my flight back to Toronto or something and re-enter the US on land. That would be grueling but probably the ultimate backup plan. 

Thank you very much @Crazy Cat, appreciate your response! I saw that there is a way to get a same day passport once you have an appointment at the passport center, but you're pretty much at their whim and they might decline it. Basically, I'm worried that if I try to do something like that and it doesn't work, I won't make it to my work trip and I'd much rather reschedule my oath ceremony if it comes to that.

I'm also considering checking for a 3rd party service that guarantees they can expedite the passport in a couple of days...

Hi everyone,

After a quicker than expected naturalization process (applied early October 2023, interview early January 2024), I just received my oath ceremony letter and it's scheduled for February 2. The problem is that I have international travel planned the week after that on February 9th, for a work trip that I cannot postpone.

I assume there is no way for me to get my US passport in that time frame, is that correct? I looked on the USCIS site and it seems like the only way is a "life or death" emergency, which I likely won't qualify for.

Also wanted to confirm, is there a way I could re-enter the US with my other passport (French passport), since I will be a dual citizen? All the answers I found say no. 

So I feel like my only option here is to ask to have my oath ceremony postponed. Has anyone ever done that, or has any advice? I know it's really not an ideal idea but not going on that trip will create enormous issues. 

Thank you for your help, those questions have probably been asked already but didn't find anything like my case upon searching.

...and that's it for me! Received my green card in the mail yesterday :). Can't believe this long and expensive adventure is FINALLY over! I'm also really happy that I won't have to travel with those goddamn extension letters anymore and that I can renew my Global Entry.

I was quite surprised to see how "cheap" the new card looks compared to the temporary one. The colors are all faded on mine and the plastic feels flimsy.

Anyway, good luck to everyone who is still waiting, I hope you all receive it soon and it's truly been a pleasure being supported and surrounded by all of you during this process. The community here really made it all the more bearable  . And special thanks to @starsky for creating and updating the approval table! 

After my case was approved a couple of days ago, yesterday I received in the mail two I-797 approval noticed... they are completely identical so I'm not sure if it's yet another bug from USCIS or what. Still waiting on the physical card.

Got a notification from case tracker this morning that my card was mailed yesterday, on the 17th (I had received the notification that my new card was produced on the 12th). Hopefully I get it by end of week! 

I just received a notification via Case Tracker a few minutes ago that my card is being produced :) . I'm a VSC filer and my case was not transferred, it stayed in Vermont. 

What a great way to start the weekend! I'll update when I receive it in the mail. 

Good luck everyone, but it seems like the wait is over and most of us should get it in the next couple of weeks at most.

Woohoo! Congrats @arthurc, I guess you're officially the first VSC case to be approved, hopefully the rest of us will follow soon!

8 hours ago, LottaY said:

Hi guys, I'm new here and I just want to share my timeline. My I-751(EAC18092xxxxx) was received on 2/9/18 at VSC. I got two notices on 2/13/19 on the new USCIS portal, first one saying my case was transferred to another USCIS office, and then second one saying my case was received at my local office. Haven't got any notice in mail yet. Hopefully this is good news...

Finally! It means things are starting to move for VSC as well. Hopefully more people will be following !

7 hours ago, Unidentified said:

We might move as well but not until I'm a citizen as I don't want to go through the mess of immigration all over again. I'm waiting until I receive my green card before applying though.

Yeah that's where I'm hesitating. If we were to move away and back to the US, I don't want to go through this mess again. But if I end up having to pay taxes in the US for the rest of my life while not being here, that's also a huge bummer. 

3 hours ago, fascinating123 said:

My wife is because her Yemeni citizenship is useless. The tax situation if we ever live overseas is far outweighed by the benefit of traveling with minimum hassle. 

That's fair. I have a French passport so it's definitely a more useful one. 

2 hours ago, EmilyRosePF said:

My wife is going to file for citizenship as soon as she gets the 10 year GC. She'll maintain dual citizenship in case we ever want to move to the UK. As a same-sex couple in the current atmosphere, we both want to be done with the immigration system.

2 hours ago, Tween said:

Heh we're in the exact same boat (I'm the English wife!) but I didn't think we could get dual citizenship because the US requires you renounce all other citizenships to be naturalised? I'd be fine being dual but I've no intention of getting naturalised as American because we intend to move back to the UK once the kids have flown the nest.

Same sex couple here as well :). I agree that the current atmosphere is also a strong push towards getting the citizenship. Tween it's good that you guys have a plan and that you know you're going back to the UK. You can indeed have dual citizenship, but if you know you are going back to the UK for good later, you should probably stick to the Green Card so you don't have to worry about taxation later. 

44 minutes ago, Slowloris said:

It is a shame you are forced to live in a country and go through the immigration process with a far inferior quality of life...oh wait you are not! 

The only reason I stayed here is because I got married, if it wasn't for that I would have left the US years ago. So, sure, technically I am not forced, but I decided that being with the person I love outweighs the burden of being here. I certainly won't apologize for that! But I'll maintain that the quality of life in the US is a tad inferior to a lot of western european countries. 

Thanks everyone for answering, that gives a lot of interesting perspectives and some food for thought. I guess my next step will be to really sink my teeth into figuring out the tax aspects of being naturalized and moving overseas, as it's still a bit blurry.

Sorry for the slight OT, now back to hoping that VSC shifts to second gear and catches up with CSC soon  .

Random question but is everyone planning on filing for citizenship? I see that some of you have already filed their N400 or will do it soon. 

Personally I don't think I'm going to do it, mostly for tax reasons if I move out of the US (I'm not planning on staying here forever, as I find the quality of life in Europe far superior but I need to be here at least for another few years ). 

2 minutes ago, GBOS said:

Does it make any sense that the fees keep going up and the processing times also keep going up?  Supposedly, the increased fees are supposed to be used to reduce the backlog through increased staffing and processing technology.  The sharp rise in processing times do not align with the flow of immigrants.

I am convinced that a lot of this is on purpose to try discouraging people (and not just under the current administration, although this one will for sure not make anything better!).

7 minutes ago, GBOS said:

Based on one post in January 2018 forum, there is one person (filed in January 2018, EAC180715XXXX) recently received an approval with no RFE or interview.  He/She appears to be an odd duck, however.  Every single approval I read and checked in January 2018 forum are all CSC filers.

 

VSC filers in November 2017 and December 2017 are also all over the place.  No logical sequences.

 

The processing times for both CSC and VSC have also just been updated yesterday.  They are both now exactly the same -- 15.5 months to 19.5 months.  CSC was shown to be longer (before the update) at 15.5 months to 21.5 months.  CSC did transfer a bunch of files to Nebraska and Texas (likely November 2017 and December 2017 filers), and maybe that is how it "magically" reduced its processing time by 2 months on the top end.  Number manipulations!

Thank you so much! That's really annoying re:VSC, at least the ones who are at CSC can set some sort of expectation but not us. We can still hope that at some point VSC might also forward some applications to other centers... one can dream!

Since CSC is already processing January filers, does anyone know where VSC is standing at the moment? And I mean based on the threads on this forum, I know a bunch of you are following the threads for January 2018 filers, December 2017 and so forth. I could dig into them, but I assume someone might have a good overview of the situation. 

5 minutes ago, stevebg14 said:

Guys I just got my Approval notice! Removal of conditions approved! Green card itself should arrive within 60 days!

Finally!!

Wow amazing dude, congrats!! Hopefully Vermont will catch up soon...

...and count me in for receiving my 18 months extension letter today as well. It must have been a busy day at the post office since it looks like they sent them all at the same time 😂.