JoeMc

It went very smoothly. We had approximately 30 sheets/pages of photos for the officer to look at. Each page had 2 to 3 photos on it. They were arranged in chronological order and each was labeled with when it was taken and who was in it. We had photos from when we were dating... taken in Beijing.... then in Myrtle Beach, in New York City with different relatives/friends... In Guilin, China visiting her sister.... Then, photos from when she arrived (last October), our wedding and the dinner afterwards (in November), Thanksgiving with relatives, Christmas with relatives... We went on a trip to Louisville to visit a friend of hers (more photos)... Visited my oldest son and his roommates in another city... Photos at approximately 6 or 8 different state parks (on a variety of dates)... (Each had something distinguishable in the background so it was obvious that the photo was taken at that park/location). We even had a cruise planned (it was canceled because of covid). I had our boarding passes (that I printed out before it was canceled) to show him... He looked at every photo and made a few comments and/or asked a few questions about how we liked different places.... For paperwork I had my tax transcripts and W-4s from 2019. I had proof that she is on my health/dental/optical insurance plan from work and that she was the beneficiary of my group life insurance from work... Joint checking account statements for each month this year... He went through the application and verbally re-asked her approximately 1/2 of the questions in it (to confirm her answers). He had her sign it. After he saw all the photos and all of the other documents he congratulated us and the green card arrived in approximately 10 days.

Our interview was September 10th in Charleston. We did not get another physical done (her physical in China was from August 2019). It never came up during the interview. (I guess the physical she took before her K-1 interview was OK/acceptable because the officer never mentioned the physical and we received her green card).

Our interview was in Charleston, SC on September 10th. It was in person with the officer.

It was that fast for us. Did they send a letter telling you to update the medical? How old is it?

Yes. I was kind of expecting a month or so to prepare. Instead I got 10 days.

Our status changed on Thursday, August 27th. The letter arrived on Monday, August 31st. Our interview is on Thursday, September 10th. I hope that helps.

I guess that they are trying to limit the number of people attending the interview. The appointment letter said that if you needed an interpreter to have them available by phone. My wife has a friend that is now a US Citizen that is able to do this. Do you think this will work? (Or do you think they would not allow a friend/acquaintance to be the interpreter.)

Date of physical/medical exam (for K-1 visa) was August 14, 2019. Date of AOS interview is now Sept 10th... Is the medical exam still valid?

Yes, I agree. The interview is 10 days after the notice arrived in the mail.

Today we received the notice for our AOS interview at Charleston, SC in the mail. It is scheduled for next Thursday (Sept 10th).

According to a few articles I read online they were required to notify the 70% of employees that would be affected by the furlough 30 days in advance. I can only speak for myself. But, if I anticipated being furloughed in a few weeks I would probably have other things/concerns on my mind that would prevent me from operating/functioning at peak efficiency at work. Aside from possible slowdowns (not necessarily intentional...just from the situation/pressure/other) why would they schedule many interviews (especially for dates in September) not knowing if they would be there to conduct the interviews? I kind of figured that (if the threat of furloughs was removed) things would proceed rapidly once the USCIS employees had some reassurances/certainty that they would be working in September and that they would have adequate staff to conduct interviews. I do expect some slowdowns, though. I read that they have instituted some severe/extreme cost cutting that negatively affected contracted workers/services. (I included a link below to one of my sources.) That will probably cause HUGE wait times and delays if you try to call the contact center for information about your case... (And other delays based upon steps/things that utilize contracted services/workers.) https://www.govexec.com/workforce/2020/08/immigration-services-agency-cancels-furloughs-13000-employees/167963/

I think/guess that they might have been holding off on scheduling too many interviews because of the pending/threatened furloughs at the end of this week. I am not surprised that they scheduled our interview soon after the furloughs were cancelled.

Yesterday our status changed to interview was scheduled. I will update our timeline when we get the letter/date of the interview.

Combo card was just delivered by USPS.

Status for AP and EAD both changed to "Case Was Approved" today. 😀