Camboturk

On 5/30/2022 at 11:33 PM, Camboturk said:

6/28/2021: Submitted N-400 application online

1/31/2022: Interview scheduled for 3/10/2022

3/10/2022: N-400 interview at JFK Building

4/4/2022: USCIS account has two updates for this date: 1) We recommended that your Form N-400, Application for Naturalization, be approved. Your case was submitted for quality review. 2) Oath Ceremony Will Be Scheduled

 

Now patiently waiting for the oath ceremony!

Almost 4 months since our naturalization interview and still waiting for the oath ceremony to be scheduled 🤔 Is there anyone we can contact about this?

6/28/2021: Submitted N-400 application online

1/31/2022: Interview scheduled for 3/10/2022

3/10/2022: N-400 interview at JFK Building

4/4/2022: USCIS account has two updates for this date: 1) We recommended that your Form N-400, Application for Naturalization, be approved. Your case was submitted for quality review. 2) Oath Ceremony Will Be Scheduled

Now patiently waiting for the oath ceremony!

3 minutes ago, FK1 said:

Congrats Cambo! Was your case originally sent to VSC or did it get transferred? Mine is at MSC finger prints were taken on Feb 12 and no movement ever since.

It went directly to VSC, it wasn't transferred.

Good luck!

Just got approved today! Relieved that we didn't have to do another interview.

Vermont Service Center (VSC)

1/20/2020: Mailed I-751 (not sure of exact date but it wasn't more than 1-2 weeks prior to the NOA)

1/24/2020: NOA

3/3/2020: Biometrics appointment

10/5/2020: Approved!

My wife got her conditional green card (2 year) in March 2018, which means the next step is to apply for citizenship around March 2021.

Best of luck to everyone else!

Just called the IRS hotline again a few hours ago and I now have more information from a more helpful agent. They said that my wife's SSN didn't come up as invalid or anything but they don't know why it's saying we are ineligible for a stimulus payment. I explained how we filed taxes on 2/1, my wife updated her status from F-1 to green card holder to the SSA on 2/12 and we also received the tax refund on the same day. My theory is that when the IRS was processing our tax refund, they saw that my wife was on an F-1 visa. When they started determining eligibility for the stimulus checks in March/April, they used the information from the tax return instead of checking the most up-to-date information and determined we weren't eligible since most people on F-1 aren't eligible. The agent agreed that this was possible but there's no way to verify it. I asked if there's anything I can do get a stimulus payment and unfortunately she said no, there's no way in the system to do that so we would just have to wait until we file our 2020 taxes and claim it as a credit. I'm bummed out this is the case but at least I have more info and I won't have to check the IRS status page every day anymore.

Just to clarify the timeline (couldn't edit my post above):

January 24, 2020: filed I-751 (Petition to Remove Conditions on Residence)

February 1, 2020: filed tax return (married filing jointly)

February 12, 2020: received tax refund via direct deposit

February 2020 (don't remember exact date): received I-797C notice that my wife's conditional resident status had been extended for 18 months

Nothing here should have affected my wife's SSN so we are really confused why the IRS says there's an issue.

On 5/2/2020 at 11:38 AM, Camboturk said:

I am a US citizen. My wife has a conditional green card that was set to expire in March 2020 so we filed the I-751, Petition to Remove Conditions on Residence in January 2020 and also received the I-797 notice that her conditional resident status had been extended for 18 months. She has been working for years and has an SSN (no ITIN). We filed our taxes (married filing jointly) in 2018 and 2019 using Credit Karma and received refunds both years via direct deposit (we didn't owe). This year, I filed on February 1st and got the refund on February 12, so the IRS SHOULD have my banking info. Note that if the timeline is important, this was AFTER we filed the I-751 and received the I-797 of extension.

 

With all that background information, the IRS stimulus check status page still says "Payment Status Not Available". I am very worried that we won't get the $2400 stimulus check. I have read that people who used Credit Karma are having issues and I think that my wife's green card status could also be a factor as well. Does anyone have any idea what we can do? Is it possible that the status page will still say "payment status not available" and a paper check will be mailed to us anyway?

 

I just read this link which seems to imply that people with pending green card applications may need to wait for their applications to be resolved first: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/why-havent-i-gotten-my-stimulus-check-yet-6-possible-reasons-your-payment-hasnt-arrived-2020-04-27 Assuming my wife's green card application is eventually approved in the future, will there be a way to retroactively claim or apply for our stimulus check?

Update to my previous post since the IRS phone line for stimulus payment questions/issues is now open: 1-800-919-9835.

I just called them since I'm still getting "payment status not available" and the person I spoke to said that there was an issue with my wife's SSN being 'invalid' that was causing us to be ineligible for a stimulus payment. I confirmed the SSN over the phone and it matched what the IRS had in their system. Basically, I have no idea what this means since my wife has had the same SSN since 2011, got a new job in February so she passed a background check etc. We will call the SSA office and see if they have any more information. Ugh...

4 minutes ago, Wuozopo said:

You filed early enough that there should be no hold up if your direct deposit refund came straight from the IRS. Some tax preps offered other ways to get refunds that channeled back through the tax prep company.
 

I don’t see anything in that article that applies to you. There are people applying for initial greencards who are nonresident aliens and file a 1040X. Your wife is a LPR and your tax return was not for a nonresident.

 

You have some kind of glitch.  Don’t try the portal but once per day or it supposedly locks you out. Type in your info exactly as it appeared on you 2019 return. The stimulus will be on the 2020 ax return to collect if you don’t manage to collect early.

Thanks, I'm glad most people seem to think that we're eligible, I was really worried somehow my wife's immigration status was the issue. As long as we get the stimulus eventually, I'm fine with that - in the mail would be even better so we don't have to wait until next year's tax season!

9 minutes ago, Lucky Cat said:

The pending I-751 is irrelevant......as my wife's I-751 is pending, and we received the $2400 stimulus.  I don't think Credit Karma is the issue either because your taxes were properly processed through the IRS (as evidenced by your receiving refunds) Did you enter all the information in the stimulus portal EXACTLY as indicated on your tax forms?  If you don't receive the $2400 stimulus now, you can claim it as a tax credit next year when filing your 2020 tax year returns.

I posted this on multiple forums pretty much everyone saying the I-751 is irrelevant, so you're probably right. I'm 99% sure I'm entering my info into the IRS portal correctly. Luckily we have lived at the same address since 2013, so it's not an issue with different addresses. Unluckily however, we live in an apartment which slightly complicates things. Anyway, I have tried entering our address exactly as it appears on our tax return and how it appears on the USPS address look up tool and no luck. If the worst case is we'll have to apply for a credit on next year's return, at least we'll eventually get it - I was scared that we wouldn't get anything at all!

Edit: I guess if the other possibility is that 1) the IRS doesn't have my banking info so they can't automatically do the direct deposit (despite the fact that I got my refund to my Bank of America account) and 2) I somehow keep entering my info wrong on the portal so I can't properly update the banking info, that would mean I would just get a paper check eventually?

I am a US citizen. My wife has a conditional green card that was set to expire in March 2020 so we filed the I-751, Petition to Remove Conditions on Residence in January 2020 and also received the I-797 notice that her conditional resident status had been extended for 18 months. She has been working for years and has an SSN (no ITIN). We filed our taxes (married filing jointly) in 2018 and 2019 using Credit Karma and received refunds both years via direct deposit (we didn't owe). This year, I filed on February 1st and got the refund on February 12, so the IRS SHOULD have my banking info. Note that if the timeline is important, this was AFTER we filed the I-751 and received the I-797 of extension.

With all that background information, the IRS stimulus check status page still says "Payment Status Not Available". I am very worried that we won't get the $2400 stimulus check. I have read that people who used Credit Karma are having issues and I think that my wife's green card status could also be a factor as well. Does anyone have any idea what we can do? Is it possible that the status page will still say "payment status not available" and a paper check will be mailed to us anyway?

I just read this link which seems to imply that people with pending green card applications may need to wait for their applications to be resolved first: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/why-havent-i-gotten-my-stimulus-check-yet-6-possible-reasons-your-payment-hasnt-arrived-2020-04-27 Assuming my wife's green card application is eventually approved in the future, will there be a way to retroactively claim or apply for our stimulus check?

Hi everyone,

Just wanted to share our interview experience at the USCIS office in Lawrence, MA, which was actually quite different from the other recent posts! FYI, I'm the petitioner and my wife is the beneficiary.

The appointment was at 8:15 AM and we arrived at 7:30 AM. We passed through security and didn't have to do any fingerprints or photos. Surprisingly, I (the petitioner) was called in by myself around 8:20 AM. I swore to tell the truth, sat down, and then the interviewer began questioning me. On a blank piece of paper, she drew two columns and was writing down my answers in one of the columns so it was obvious that she was going to cross-check my answers with my wife (the beneficiary) later.

Some questions I can remember:

• Do you live in a house or apartment? How many bedrooms are there? Do you own or rent?
• When and where we got married
• How did you meet your wife? - This is actually what I talked about for the majority of the interview. My wife and I are graduate students and the interviewer was actually a little familiar with our field, so I spent a lot of time explaining what I work on, what my wife works on, etc.
• Have you met her family and vice versa
• Do you have any vacation plans? - I told her we were going to a gaming convention in a few weeks and she asked what video games we play, a few of which she was familiar with since she had teenage boys

Those are the types of "factual" questions I was asked, which I was happy to answer since I knew all the answers. She didn't ask me any "subjective" questions like what is your wife's favorite color, movie, food, etc. Honestly, it doesn't seem like a lot of questions, but I feel like she was just prodding me to have a conversation about our relationship which lead to us chatting.

After that, she asked if I had any more materials. We didn't file the I-693 medical exam with our initial package so I gave that to her, which was the only thing she kept. I also had our 2017 joint tax return which I showed her and our vacation plans (we printed out emails for hotel reservations) for later this year. We also brought 3-4 photo albums but we never showed them to her. All in all, my interview took ~15 minutes. Then she escorted me out of the room and she interviewed my wife (alone) for about ~5 minutes, and then I was called back in. When I re-entered the room, my wife was smiling and it seemed like her part of the interview had also gone well. It turned out that interviewer was very familiar with one of the places my wife and I are visiting later this year (she said she has literally gone there every year for the past 19 years) so we were honestly just chatting for 10 minutes while she was giving us suggestions on places to see, where to eat, etc. At this point, the interviewer quickly went through the I-485 to verify everything line-by-line and then said we were approved!

My wife said the interviewer basically asked her the same things I was asked before to verify my answers. Overall, I think we got lucky because our interviewer was familiar with several major facets of our life which made the interview feel less like a grilling session and more like a casual conservation. She was very friendly and laughed at our jokes.

For the next few days, I kept checking https://egov.uscis.gov/ for a case update but it still had the previous update: "We scheduled you for your interview and mailed you an interview notice." After some Googling, I realized there was ANOTHER site that is much more up to date: https://myaccount.uscis.dhs.gov/. I don't know why there are 2 case status pages, but I recommend everyone use the latter one since it is updated much more frequently (I was getting notifications immediately for that one, whereas the former site would take 7+ days later with the exact same information). Here's what it said:

3/29: We are producing your card and will mail it to you (this was the same day as our interview)

3/30: We approved your case (this is not a typo, this update came AFTER the previous one)

4/2: We mailed your card to you. The U.S. Postal Service will deliver it.

We received the card on 4/5, exactly a week after our interview. My wife and I are both super happy and amazed since everything happened much faster than we expected; we mailed in our application package around Christmas, so the entire process took just over three months. We were originally hoping for it to take less than a year.

Good luck to everyone else and I'd be happy to answer anyone's questions!

2 minutes ago, logisticamente said:

I know you didn't ask me this.. but I just had my interview yesterday so I thought I could help.

• My husband and I were together the entire time. There was only one couple that got interviewed separately and long while we were waiting (about an hour), we saw at least 5 other couples go in and come out (I didn't really count)
• They didn't ask any personal questions, just where in my country we went for our honeymoon. after that my husband was pretty much ignored the whole time and it was all about me and the I-485 form.
• It was neither.. in my case it felt like he was just doing it because "he had to check that box".. which I guess is good? but like I said in my previous post, he wasn't mean or disrespectful, he just seemed like he didn't wanna have a conversation but just get over the mandatory questions.

Hope this helps!

Awesome, thank you for the answers! And congratulations!

On 3/16/2018 at 11:55 AM, skaratso said:

I just posted a review of our experience on our timeline, but I will include it here as well.

 

We had our Green Card interview on 3/15/18. We arrived at the federal building (Our field office is the Cleveland, Ohio one) about 45 minutes early and parked at one of the numerous parking garages in the vicinity (The one we used was for the Galleria at Erieview, which is almost right across the street). The interview notice said to bring any original documents that we submitted copies of with the application and also any evidence of a bona fide marriage. So we brought some documentation of joint bank accounts, statements that my wife is on my health insurance and named as beneficiary of my retirement accounts, some pictures of the two of us together since we were married, and some mail we've received showing we live at the same address.

There was an airport-style security line we needed to pass through (have your ID ready to show the guards), and then we headed up to the 5th floor USCIS office. There were three cubicles, two of which were occupied with people checking in, and one which was unoccupied but with a tray on the desk. We were instructed to put the Interview Notice in the tray on that unoccupied desk and wait to be called on. There were several rows of chairs in front of a door and there were probably 20 or so people there when we arrived.

After about an hour we were called to one of the occupied cubicles and my wife was photographed and fingerprinted to confirm her identity, then we were directed to go back and sit in the waiting area. About 30 minutes later a women opened the door and invited us both back into her office.

She introduced herself and there was another officer present in the room who we were told would be observing us (presumably being trained). We were informed the interview was being recorded and then we were sworn in. The officer first asked to see my wife's passport and my driver's license. Then she went over my wife's AOS application, section by section, verifying all the information, including her name, date of birth, and our address. She asked if my wife knew my date of birth and my full name. When my wife just gave my first and last name, the officer asked, "And does he have a middle name?" which prompted my wife to give my middle name. She went through about 20 of the questions ("do you intend to engage in illegal activities, are you a terrorist, etc). She asked if my wife was working and she was told no. "Didn't you file for EAD?" Yes, but we haven't gotten the card yet. 

After going through the application she looked at my wife's original birth certificate and gave it back. She did not ask for mine (though I brought it like the notice said to). She asked us to tell her how we met and wanted to know the name of the website we met on. She wanted to know when we first met in person and wanted to know why there was such a long gap between when we met online and when we met in person. She asked who travelled where first when we first met. We told her that we have met in person several times prior to filing the K1 and had taken trips together). She asked when I went to meet her in person, what day we started dating and when I proposed to my wife. She was surprised my wife knew the exact dates of all of those.

She asked if my wife was on my insurance and where I worked. She asked if we were intermingling our finances. We told her we are in the process of buying a house together. She did not ask to see any of the evidence we brought.

She looked though her computer for some items ("They didn't send the originals of your medical exam here. I see you passed it but my supervisor might want to see the originals. If that's the case it will take us an additional 2 weeks to get it here.") She told my wife she was "recommending the application be approved" and told us that when her supervisor signed off on it we'd get the Green Card in about a month. Then she congratulated us and led us back to the waiting area and we left the building.

Today (the day after the interview) our case status online changed to "Your card is being produced and will be mailed to you" so obviously her supervisor approved it without needing to see the original medical exam.
 

Thanks for sharing your experience! My wife and I have our interview soon and were wondering if you could answer some questions:

• It sounds like you and your wife were together the entire time, so they didn't interview you separately? Did they direct most of the questions towards the sponsor or the applicant?
• Were there any personal questions about each other you didn't know the answer to? If so, how did you handle them?
• How was the demeanor of the interviewer? Did it feel like you were being grilled or was it more like a casual conversation?

Thanks again!

3 minutes ago, MrPotatoHead said:

Congrats! We have an almost identical situation and time line. Did your case status change at all up until today? My wife has done the biometrics but the case status is still sitting at "Received" and last updated 12/22/2017

Thank you! Yes actually, I remember checking the case status around 2/10 and it said something like "your case is ready to be scheduled for an interview", which I interpreted to mean that the biometrics appointment was successful (I had read a few instances online that some people had to re-do another biometrics appointment). For some reason this status update doesn't show up in the case history of my I-485 though, it just says this:

Quote

02/15/2018 We are ready to schedule your Form I-485, Application to Register Permanent Residence or Adjust Status, for an interview.
01/01/2018 We accepted the fingerprint fee for your Form I-485, Application to Register Permanent Residence or to Adjust Status. Our National Benefits Center location is working on your case.

Hi everyone, first post here. I submitted on behalf of my wife who is currently on an F-1 visa. Here is our timeline:

Mid-December 2017: Concurrently filed I-130 (I-130A), I-131, I-485, I-765, I-864 to Chicago lockbox

12/22/2017: Received date and priority date

1/2/2018: I-797C Notice of action of all forms received

1/5/2018: I-797C Notice of action for biometrics appointment at USCIS Boston (Revere, MA)

1/25/2018: Biometrics appointment completed

1/26/2018: Courtesy letter to applicant that I-693 was NOT filed (we intentionally didn't file I-693 since it's only valid for a year and we didn't know when we would have our interview date)

2/15/2018: Interview scheduled for 3/29/2018

We just received an email and case status update today that the interview has already been scheduled! Here is what the case status page says: 

Quote

On February 15, 2018, we scheduled you for your interview and mailed you an interview notice for Receipt Number MSC__________. Your interview is on March 29, 2018. Please follow the instructions in the notice. If you do not receive your interview notice by March 17, 2018, please go to www.uscis.gov/e-request to request a copy of the notice. If you move, go to www.uscis.gov/addresschange to give us your new mailing address.

And the email:

Quote

*** DO NOT RESPOND TO THIS E-MAIL *** 

There has been a recent processing action taken on your case. 

Receipt Number: MSC_______________

Application Type: I485, APPLICATION TO REGISTER PERMANENT RESIDENCE OR ADJUST STATUS 

Your Case Status: Testing and Interview 

On February 15, 2018, we scheduled you for your interview and mailed you an interview notice for Receipt Number MSC____________. Your interview is on March 29, 2018. Please follow the instructions in the notice. If you do not receive your interview notice by March 17, 2018, please go to www.uscis.gov/e-request to request a copy of the notice. If you move, go to www.uscis.gov/addresschange to give us your new mailing address. 

If your case status indicates that you are currently in this step, you have either been scheduled for an interview or are in line to be scheduled for an interview. The amount of time your application will remain in this step will vary by office and is largely determined by the number of cases ahead of yours. The interview notice will have specifics about time, location and anything you will need to bring to your interview. If your application remains pending beyond our normal processing times (as shown below) please contact our national customer service center at 1-800-375-5283. Please note that not every application/applicant will require an interview. In some instances, an interview is required by regulation and others an interview is requested because USCIS has determined that this is the most efficient means to determine eligibility. For a naturalization application the interview will include your taking the required English and/or Civics tests (unless exempt or waived). 
 

• Log-in to your myUSCIS account to view your case history and understand what you can expect to happen next on your case.
• Current processing times can be found on the USCIS website at under Check Processing Times.

Sincerely,

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS)

We only filed our package less than 2 months ago so we are surprised that we already have an interview date set. If it's real, we need to get our I-693 (medical exam) done ASAP.