uluslarci

2 minutes ago, debbiedoo said:

1. send whatever the equivalent to a w2 is for her. They need to see the separation of who earned what money, since foreign income is not allowed for 8464 purposes.

 

2. upload and label everything seprately

 

3. the documents you mentioned for proof of domicile are fine. The 864 needs to reflect the new address. if the joint sponsors information has not changed, nothing needs to be done with theirs. unless they are claiming her as a dependent on their taxes, no changes need to be made (and being married they would not be able to anyways i dont believe)

Thank you.

1. We actually uploaded the relevant documents. Her 2555  and relevant schedules etc were attached. . 1040X -we amended the tax return- was attached. My W-2 and 1042-S were attached. We don't have anything else to give...

2. Could you please clarify this part? You mean I-864 will be a separate document, the cover letter will be different, and tax documents -W-2 and others- will be separate? Should we combine W-2 to other tax documents?

3. So, just to make sure, my wife needs to resubmit her I-864 with the updated address information?

Thank you!

Hello all,

We got a RFE at NVC stage so we've submitted our documents again. However, we've gotten another RFE. I am the applicant and my wife is the petitioner.

1. Here is little background: I made money in the US although I was not in the US. It was a research fellowship and a little service stipend for research that I made for a professor. I am Ph.D. student at a US college but I've been living abroad for last 2 years for my doctoral research. My wife -the petitioner and the US citizen- lived with me too so she had foreign income, not US income. We file taxes jointly. So we added my W-2 but she does not have one. In our first time, NVC asked for her W-2. This time, following the advises we got here, we put a cover letter explaining why she does not have a W-2. The result is: NVC is still asking for her W-2! We don't have it and we won't have it. What do you suggest us to do? I understand that it is probably confusing for the officer that the applicant is making US money while he is not in the US and the petitioner is making foreign money but we really explained it very clearly with a cover letter. So I don't understand what they want us to do.

2. They say they don't want combined documents. We put the cover letter, a new I-864, and related tax documents as one pdf file. Is this wrong? Should we separate them? We did the same for the joint sponsor's I-864 and his wife I-864A (joint sponsor is my wife's dad)

3. Domicile issue... My wife was living with me until a few days ago. So I-864's present address was our foreign address. It was OK at the first time but now they ask for the proof of her domicile. The thing is that my wife is back in the US now and is living with her parents.She can provide state ID, a letter from her parents saying that she is living with them, bank accounts etc but does she need to submit a new I-864 to change her present address? In that case, does her dad -the joint sponsor- also need to submit a new I-864 because probably my wife will be there? I think the answer is no for this because she won't be counted as a household member? We are not using her income to sponsor me. She does not have a job in the US anyway. She just got there.

Thank you.

9 hours ago, Cheridane123 said:

How did you solve this ?

Ok, so now it is available. It took a day for us.

7 hours ago, Cheridane123 said:

How did you solve this ?

We haven't been able to solve it yet. It is still does not let us upload the things.

Hello,

We've submitted my wife's I-864 and my joint sponsor's I-864 along with the documents. Then we clicked on "add a household member" on ceac.gov to add the joint sponsor's wife's I-864A and other documents.

We got the message saying that it is accepted but we still cannot click on it to submit the documents. It says "N/A".

Are we supposed to wait more or are we supposed to add I-864A and the documents related to it under the name of the joint sponsor? How does it work?

Thanks

Hello all,

My wife is being the main sponsor but she is abroad so she technically cannot be a sponsor. So we have a joint sponsor, her dad, who is also filling out a separate I864.

For my wife's I864, should we still show our money in the Bank (American bank) as our assets for part 7 in the form? We read the instructions and it says we should add the assets if the sponsor cannot meet the minimum requirements for being sponsor, assets should be added. This is true for our case but we have a joint sponsor so actually, we are not using our money to make my wife our sponsor without the joint sponsor.

Does it look better to have some money in the account or does it just create confusion so we should leave the part 7 blank?

Thank you.

 

 

1

40 minutes ago, pushbrk said:

Which year(s) are you talking about?  Are you trying to amend the tax return yourself without appropriate software or professional assistance?  You made this mess?  Are you confident you can clean it up yourself?  Are you sure you know ALL the mistakes you made?

 

Does the AGI number look to be as low as you think it should be?

We are just talking about the most recent year -2018- taxes. We are not submitting the tax documents for 2017 and 2016 anyway. And we are just talking about my wife's taxes. Joint sponsor's don't have this problem.

Alright, so apparently I need to explain why I am trying to find an answer here. I wish a software or a professional could help us but softwares don't work for us because of our specific situation: my wife, the US citizen who makes foreign income and lives abroad and I, the applicant who makes US income and lives abroad; and we've been filing jointly since we got married 2 years ago. We attached a statement to file jointly and I had already an SSN number because I was already in the US when we got married. Long story short, softwares do not work for our case. They are not designed for that complicated situations. There is no appropriate software. Otherwise, we would not bother ourselves. Professional assistance did not work either. We tried to call a couple of them and could not get coherent and confident answers. Both of us are not in the US. Maybe it would be easier if we were in the US but we just cannot keep spending tons of money for generic and useless answers on the phone. Oh, in the meantime, we cannot get tax transcripts online because IRS has a problem with foreign addresses in case someone again brings this up. So it is also not an option. Needless to say, NVC is not accessible on the phone. We tried to call them tons of time. I am really wondering how people here are able to talk to someone on the phone. 

We think that under those circumstances, we did our best and we solved ALL the problems in the tax document. There was mainly one problem anyway. It just affects all the tax forms we submitted since the calculation ends up being different although the refund we've gotten won't change. The other problem was about the I-864. My wife put her own personal income in the total income question instead of writing our all jointly filed income. So we are only fixing it. 

AGI number now looks normal. As I said before, we've already gotten our tax refund. Nothing will change. This is just for correcting the data with IRS and get over the confusion with the NVC officer who asked my wife's W-2 for the wrong data there.

So we have two options now

1. to write AGI that is in 1040X for the total income and adding a sentence to our cover letter explaining it. 

2. to write total income, which is slightly different than the AGI, by adding a corrected 1040 just to show the total income and again adding a sentence to our cover letter to explain it. But I don't think we should submit another 1040 for solely this purpose, which can cause another confusion. After all, 1040X is going to IRS and it is the official thing now. 

So, again, if I've clarified what I am asking, any idea or experience regarding this?

We are amending our tax return so we are filing the 1040X.

1040X does not have a "total income" line like the 1040 does. But it has an Adjusted Gross Income line.

Is it OK to put this amount in the total income information of the I-864? Any idea or experience?

Thanks.

24 minutes ago, uluslarci said:

My wife reported her foreign earned income with Form 2555 and took the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion. This amount gets carried from Form 2555 to Schedule 1 (Form 1040) as a negative number in parentheses and gets subtracted from other additional income on that form. The result, for us, is another negative number. This amount gets carried to Form 1040 Line 6 and, as a negative number, gets subtracted from the wages and salaries reported on the 1040. On our jointly filed return, with me -the applicant- earning US income and the other -my wife, petitioner and the US citizen- earning foreign income, the amount on Line 6, "total income," comes out very low. It seems strange to subtract the foreign income from all the other income to come to the total income. Is this correct? 

 

When we put her total income, which is our total income as stated on the 1040 Line 6, in the I-864, it creates a number which does not line up with W-2 and 1042S that we submitted (it is much lower). Is this normal? As long as the amount lines up with everything on all our tax forms, will the NVC accept it?

 

 

And also should she report her foreign income on line 1 of the 1040? 

She reported it on form 2555 only.

Also, it shows up on Line 6 of 1040 via Schedule I as a negative amount as I said in my previous post. 

My wife reported her foreign earned income with Form 2555 and took the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion. This amount gets carried from Form 2555 to Schedule 1 (Form 1040) as a negative number in parentheses and gets subtracted from other additional income on that form. The result, for us, is another negative number. This amount gets carried to Form 1040 Line 6 and, as a negative number, gets subtracted from the wages and salaries reported on the 1040. On our jointly filed return, with me -the applicant- earning US income and the other -my wife, petitioner and the US citizen- earning foreign income, the amount on Line 6, "total income," comes out very low. It seems strange to subtract the foreign income from all the other income to come to the total income. Is this correct? 

When we put her total income, which is our total income as stated on the 1040 Line 6, in the I-864, it creates a number which does not line up with W-2 and 1042S that we submitted (it is much lower). Is this normal? As long as the amount lines up with everything on all our tax forms, will the NVC accept it?

31 minutes ago, uluslarci said:

So, again just to make sure, we should submit a 1040X to amend our tax return to IRS. And we should submit a new I-864 to NVC with corrected information with an explanation and 1040X that will have the corrected total income? And in our explanation, we are going to say that "please disregard the first I-864 that is already accepted by the NVC officer. And please review the new one." along with the explanation we made a mistake. In that case, we don't need to wait for any response from IRS. We will sort of just start over with new I-864s to be reviewed.

 

Is that true? I am just being very cautious because we apparently had messed up with the documents before.

 

In the meantime, I-864 is accepted but the officer asked for W-2 of my wife because we made a mistake. We don't have it because she had foreign income which apparently was not supposed to be in 1040 and I-864. That's why we tend to replace I-864 with a new one along with 1040X, 2555, my W-2 and 1042S and so on instead of moving with the accepted old I-864 and bring the corrected versions to the interview.

Just now, pushbrk said:

Amend the tax return, so it is correct.

So, again just to make sure, we should submit a 1040X to amend our tax return to IRS. And we should submit a new I-864 to NVC with corrected information with an explanation and 1040X that will have the corrected total income? And in our explanation, we are going to say that "please disregard the first I-864 that is already accepted by the NVC officer. And please review the new one." along with the explanation we made a mistake. In that case, we don't need to wait for any response from IRS. We will sort of just start over with new I-864s to be reviewed.

Is that true? I am just being very cautious because we apparently had messed up with the documents before.

3 minutes ago, NikLR said:

Tax transcripts... amend your taxes. 

We don't have tax the transcripts. IRS has a problem with foreign addresses for online transcripts and if we have them mail the transcripts, it will take 6-8 weeks. They even might not be ready yet.

1. What about sending the forms with an explanation as I said, and in the meantime, we can send a 1040X to IRS in order to amend the original 1040. If NVC does not care about my wife's mistake reporting her foreign income in 1040 because the joint sponsor is my wife's dad, I can take 1040X to the interview?

Her mistake does not put her into a situation in which she ends up not reporting the money she made. Rather, she reports her foreign income about which the IRS does not care. But of course this is wishful thinking.

2. Another option, we send a 1040X to IRS and submit a copy of that 1040X to the NVC with a new, corrected I-864 and explain the situation?

12 hours ago, pushbrk said:

You should find that her foreign income is not included in the total income on line 22.  How it's handled on line 6 of the 2018 tax return is something I haven't seen yet, but that's the number you used for the tax section regardless.

 

The premise of your question, "deciding total income" is off.  You do not "decide" total income.  You enter the number from the total income line on the first page of a 1040 form.  No "decision" to make.

So we've checked the 1040 form, line 6.

Apparently, she made a mistake too when she filled out the form 2555, that brought the wrong amount of money to Schedule I, and that ended up putting her foreign income in 1040, line 6. That's why all this confusion started. As far as I understand, there is nothing to do about it for now. Normally, her foreign income would not be there. It'd be just my US income. And we would justify it through my W-2 and 1042-S. But now our total income in line 6 of 1040 includes my US income and her foreign income.

Should we still write the total income that we see in line 6 for I-864 although it has her foreign income mistakenly? We thought we can do this, and add a letter explaining the situation. We will, of course, also attach her 2555 and Schedule I along with 1040 and my W2 and 1042S. Theoretically, her dad is being my sponsor so it should be OK but what do you think?

 

 

 

2

4 minutes ago, pushbrk said:

Yes, except you don't seem to be clear on "total income" yet.  It's a line on the tax return labeled total income.  For 2018 it's line 6.  For prior years it's line 22 on the first page of the 1040.  If you look, you'll find that line does NOT include any foreign income unless she failed to take the foreign income exclusion.

 

Total income from the tax return, not total revenue.  Again, current income does not come from a tax return.  It's your gross paycheck times the number of pay periods in a year.

 

Context.  Your wife does not have zero income.  She has zero income she is using to qualify, because there is none she can "use to qualify".  Don't ignore phrases of sentences like "to qualify" or "from tax return" etc.

She actually has a foreign income exclusion if we mean the same thing: She does not make over $103.000. But she also filled out a Schedule I because form 2555 makes her fill out Schedule I, so line 22 from it -her foreign income- goes into the total income in 1040. So I assume we are supposed to put whatever line 6 of 1040 says for I-864. I'll look into the tax forms again though. Maybe there is another mistake done there too. 

But at least, we are clear about the rest. 

In the meantime, our previous I-864s were accepted but the NVC officer was asking for both my wife and her dad's W2s. Neither of them has W2 because my wife had foreign income and her dad is retired. Is it OK to resubmit new I-864s as extra documents with an explanation even if the old ones are accepted? Would NVC just disregard them?

14 minutes ago, pushbrk said:

Exactly correct.  Now, how did you deal with the current income being used to qualify.....?  This does not come from a tax return.  Not also that she did not file a 1040EZ, so use the "total income" line NOT the AGI line.

We will just re-upload a new I-864 as an extra document with the explanation because NVC officer was asking W2 anyway. We apparently messed up with it.

So just to make sure I get what you say correctly:

We will put the total income that we see in our 1040 for the last three years regardless of it is my income or her foreign income or US income.

For the current income -Part 6, Item 7, we will put zero because her foreign income won't continue. Is that what we are supposed to do? That is our understanding. 

We also apparently messed up with his dad's I-864, who is the joint sponsor. He did not put the total income for the Part 6/Item 24a and b as their jointly filed tax return shows -he also files with his wife jointly. He just put only his portion. So for the total income part, with the same logic, he will put the total income with his wife as the tax return shows, but he will write only his income as the current income (Part 6/Item 7). Along with the I-864, they will add an I-864A that will be filled by his wife.

Does this sound like a plan for our situation?

Hello all,

We are at the NVC stage. It is a complicated situation but I'll try to be clear.

The petitioner and the US citizen -my wife- had income for the third most recent year in the US. We were not married yet so we did not file taxes jointly.

For the second most recent year, she had income in the US and filed taxes jointly with me. I had US income too.

In the most recent year, she was living abroad with me so she did not have income from a US source but she had foreign income. But I had US income. 

We have her dad as the joint sponsor.

When she filled out I-864, she put only her portions of our income for Part 6, Item 24a and 24b which ask: My total income (adjusted gross income on Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Form 1040EZ) as reported on my Federal income tax returns for the most recent three years was:

So the third most recent year is straightforward. She put only her income and we did not file taxes jointly. So this is ok.

For the second most recent year, we both had US income and we filed taxes jointly. But she put only her portion, not the total income that is stated in 1040 because she thought this is what they are asking for. 

For the most recent year, she put her foreign income for which she filed a tax form (2555) for the Americans who live abroad. But our 1040's total income included my US income too.

We've submitted I-864. It is accepted but it looks like we made a mistake.

So

1. Should she put the total income every time which includes my US income for all years and her foreign income for the last year?

2. Should we replace the income information in the way I described in the first question and resubmit a new I-864 as an extra document?

Thanks

5 hours ago, pushbrk said:

To avoid delay.  Get an I-864a from the joint filing spouse of the joint sponsor.  Not going to argue with you.  You will not win an argument with a Consular Officer.  Try reading the anonymous quote in my signature, and realize you don't understand the big picture.  I do, and Consular Officers do.  Your future happiness is in their hands.

 

Ok, I see. So it depends on the experience you have. Fair enough. Thank you. In the meantime, I do not mean to argue with you or someone else. I am just trying to figure out what to do. 

But, if I get an I864A and submit it, then does it mean that I will need to change the I-864 which is already accepted by the NVC officer? Should I assume we will need to change the amount of money because now it will be combined income?

Oh, I've just noticed that maybe I misled you before. He wrote his wife as a household member in Part 5, Item 3. That's what I meant before.

But he did not add her in item 7 of Part 5. Plus, he only wrote his own income in Part 6, Item 7 as I mentioned in my previous message. Do I make sense? 

- Item Number 7. This question gives you the option of including certain other non-dependent relatives who are living in your residence as part of your household size. Such relatives may include your mother, father, sister, brother or adult children, if they are living in your residence. However, the only reason to include these relatives in your household size is if you need to include their income when you calculate your household income for purposes of meeting the income requirement for this affidavit. To be considered, any relative included in this category must sign and submit Form I-864A, Contract Between Sponsor and Household Member. (Dad did not include mom in his household size in this section, because he meets the income requirement.)

10 hours ago, pushbrk said:

You'll dismiss the W2 issues for your wife with an explanation.

 

You need it because they are going to ask for it. No other answer as to why, is relevant.  It's the best practice in order to avoid delays.  Hopefully, dad submitted an I-864 not I-864a.  You can take mom's I-864a to the interview or submit it now.  You are doing something wrong.  Do as I advised, or expect delay while you do it later.

Yes, dad submitted I-864, not I-864a. It is my bad that I said I-864a in my previous post. 

Thank you again for your time and help.

I  am asking it because I think each case has its own situation. And, that's why I am trying to stick to the instructions religiously. 

So, again over and over, I looked at the instructions regarding when to file an I-864A. In our situation, I do not see any reason to fill it out, because dad uses only his income. Do you say that mom needs to fill I864-A out because they file taxes jointly? Would not the officer add this to her/his comments then? 

My point here is not to refrain from submitting I-864A but I do not want to create a conflicting situation that will confuse the officer more, which can cause another delay. Dad does not use a combined income to sponsor. In the instructions I share below, I do not see any reason to submit it. But what you say is based on tons of experience, I assume. So actually am I supposed to disregard the instructions? Or do I misinterpret them? Would you mind showing me where it says that a household member who is not a joint sponsor needs to submit I864A in case I miss it?

- Item Number 7. This question gives you the option of including certain other non-dependent relatives who are living in your residence as part of your household size. Such relatives may include your mother, father, sister, brother or adult children, if they are living in your residence. However, the only reason to include these relatives in your household size is if you need to include their income when you calculate your household income for purposes of meeting the income requirement for this affidavit. To be considered, any relative included in this category must sign and submit Form I-864A, Contract Between Sponsor and Household Member. (Dad did not include mom in his household size in this section, because he meets the income requirement.)

- Item Numbers 8. - 22. Current Annual Household Income. This section is used to determine the sponsor’s household income. If your individual annual income listed in Item Number 7. is greater than 125 percent (or 100 percent if you are on active duty in the U.S. Armed Forces or U.S. Coast Guard and sponsoring your spouse or child) of the Federal Poverty Guidelines for your household size from Part 5., Item Number 8., you do not need to include any other household member’s income. See Form I-864P for information on the Federal Poverty Guidelines. (Dad did not include mom's income because his income is greater than 125 percent of the Federal Poverty Guidelines.)

- To determine the filing requirements for your relatives included in Part 6., Item Numbers 8. - 19., follow the instructions below. 1. If you included the income of your spouse listed in Part 5., Item Number 3., any child listed in Part 5., Item Number 4., any dependent listed in Part 5., Item Number 5., or any siblings, parents, or adult children listed in Part 5., Item Number 7., each one of these individuals must be over 18 years of age and must complete Form I-864A. (Dad did not include any other people's income)

- How Can My Relatives and Dependents Help Me Meet the Income Requirements? 

You may use the income of your spouse and/or any other relatives living in your residence if they are willing to be jointly responsible with you for the intending immigrants you are sponsoring. If you have any unrelated dependents listed on your Federal income tax return you may include their income regardless of where they reside. The income of such household members and dependents can be used to help you meet the income requirements if they complete and sign Form I-864A, Contract Between Sponsor and Household Member, and if they are at least 18 years of age when they sign the affidavit. (Again the same, he does not include any other income other than his individual income)

29 minutes ago, pushbrk said:

Should also include I-864a from joint sponsor's spouse.  NVC might do without it but the Consular Officer will probably request it, causing delay.  Otherwise,  call NVC to straighten it out.

We keep calling NVC but it just hangs up. I am really curious about how people have been able to reach someone out through the phone.

I really appreciate your help. I've two more questions:

1. And do you think it is enough if we submit a letter explaining that I was the one who got the money from the US source, and that's why my wife does not have W-2? 

2. But my joint sponsor's (my father-in-law) income is enough to be my sponsor, that's why only he filed I-864a by stating only his income in the form. He counted his spouse as a household member. Why do we need to add another I-864a for his wife? Doesn't the officer seem to ask all W-2 related to my father-in-law because probably s/he saw more money in the tax return forms, which was confusing? I mean, after all, my in-laws, file their taxes jointly so it is inevitable to have both incomes in the tax return documents. So I thought adding his wife's W-2 would be sufficient. I am just asking because I am trying to make sure we are not doing something wrong.

18 hours ago, pushbrk said:

Unless her income will continue from the same source after she returns to the US, she should have stated her current income as zero.  If she did not, and she said she was employed, that would be why they want to see the W2.  If that's the case, you need to submit a correctly executed I-864, and if applicable, joint sponsor affidavit and supporting documents.

 

What is the exact wording of the request, in context?

 

I said the form 255 but it should be the form 2555 -  Foreign Earned Income. I just wanted to correct my previous post.

Here is the exact wording:

Case FE Review: Please submit every Form W-2 on "my father-in-law"s submitted tax transcript or tax return.

Need document: Additional support documentation is required. Please submit every Form W-2 on "my wife's" submitted tax transcript or tax return.

Transcripts are not ready for the recent year. Plus, the IRS has a problem with foreign addresses. So, for now, it is not an option.

Just to clarify: My wife has foreign income. I am with her in my home country. I had US income - fellowship. She did not have any US income. We filed our taxes jointly (1040), and she submitted the form 255 for the US citizens who have foreign income.

In I-864, she said zero for her income but she said she is employed for the first question of Part 6 because she is employed abroad. She also said "yes" for 23.a in part 6 because she filed federal income tax.

The problem is that we filed jointly but actually I made this money from the US source, not her. Is that confusing part? We were just trying to be straightforward and honest with all the information we give.

Another problem is that her dad -retired so no W-2- is being the joint sponsor but apparently his federal income tax return includes his wife's income too. So,

If we upload her dad's wife's W-2 and also write a letter explaning my wife's situation and why there is no W-2 on behalf of her, would this solve the problem?

Please let me know if there is something that I need to clarify more.

Thank you.

Hello all,

We submitted all our documents to the Ceac's website. My wife, who is the US citizen and petitioner, has been working abroad in my country so she does not have W-2. However, we still have filed our taxes jointly because I had some income from the US - research fellowships so I did not need to be in the US but I used them to conduct research abroad. We actually submitted W-2 for my income but NVC is asking for my wife's W-2 that she does not have. We've been calling them but no chance to reach out someone yet. Is there anyone who has an idea about what to do? 

Should we just write a letter explaining the situation and upload it? Is my wife supposed to submit something official about her foreign income? She does not have W-2s but she has paystubs for her foreign income so that's what she can upload if it is necessary.

Thank you so much

Hi everyone,

So I got this too because I even did not think about it. I just uploaded whatever the pdf is. Anyway, what is done is done. But I don't want to make another mistake. So is it enough to just orientate the pdf file horizontally or am I supposed to re-scan the document horizontally? 

Thank you.