ayestaci

3 minutes ago, David Utomi said:

I will like to apply for a US tourist visa to visit my wife in the US since it looks like its gonna be a long waiting process. Have anyone here applied for a US tourist visa or traveled to visit their partner in the US? 

Did it in September for 3 weeks on ESTA after filing in July and it was absolutely fine.

Considering doing it again, but the anxiety of crossing the border with a CR-1 in progress is too real even though I've done it once fine before. But I visited maybe 10 times before filing the CR-1 and once after so far, and I've never had any real issues, knock on wood it continues. 

Worth mentioning though it's very hard to get a tourist visa with an immigrant visa petition filed! If you already have one (or have ESTA for those from a visa waiver country), it's much easier to visit.

Just now, NinPran said:

What group is this if you don"t mind sharing. 

IOE Receipt Numbers - I-130 CR1& K1 US Visa Alliance

 If you search for it on FB, you should be able to join if you aren't already a member

Just now, NinPran said:

is this the one regarding the I-130 A ?

They never said specifically what the RFE was for, only that they just received one! At least not in the group I'm in. 

Looks like someone in a FB group I'm in from Potomac got a RFE yesterday, PD 4th July. So they are moving on July, but very slowly.

Potomac is SUCH a mystery! We're mid-July so I'm just sort of hanging on waiting. We saw each other over Christmas and I was hoping to be able to be move before planning another visit, since crossing the border with a CR-1 in process makes me REALLY nervous (and will even more after NOA2), but if it's gonna be another 6 months before it's all done... may have to risk it. 

14 hours ago, Nyro33 said:

Hello

 

Looks like Potomac is still moving forward! We received approval with a NOA2 date of 7/22.

 

Wishing all of you speedy approvals, as well.

Congratulations! Good to hear. 

My estimate has gone back to November 2019! Think we're all good and one rogue timeline was messing with us.

Nevermind! My estimate has gone back to November.

Yeah, my estimate has changed to April-August 2020 from November 2019 overnight. It's based on VJ user data so I'm hoping someone just entered a rogue timeline that skewed the data? That's a BIG overnight jump. 

9 minutes ago, PoojaCh said:

Mine was oct end till yesterday and now it’s showing mar-jul 2020. Idk what’s going on. I thought Potomac was supposed to be quicker than the other centers. Rather than working on speeding up the process, they are delaying it. 

VisaJourney's estimates are based on others users' timelines so I'm hoping someone has just entered a wrong date that messed with the data. A 6-9 month jump overnight seems crazy. But hopefully in the thread I made, someone can shed light. 

Just now, S&J2013 said:

That’s why, although this site is good for estimates, it can’t be relied upon fully as not everyone fills in their timelines, and not everyone who’s in the process uses this site either. It just made me look at mine, and Nebraska still sucks with an end of June/early July estimate..... I’m still gutted as I needed to have visa in hand by that time to get my girls into the new school year 😭

I'm crossing my fingers for you! Maybe you'll get lucky with the new IOE numbers, people have had good fortune with those so far. 🙂 

Hey all!

Hope this is the right place to put this.

When I originally entered my CR-1 timeline (NOA1 22nd July), it showed me a November 2019 NOA2 estimate for Potomac. Now it's showing April-August 2020 which is a wide range and seems... very far off, especially for Potomac? Any idea what caused this sudden jump—did someone upload a weird timeline that skewed the data, or is new info suggesting it really jumped that far, that fast? How is everyone else's Potomac timeline looking?

5 minutes ago, S&J2013 said:

I just saw that!! Originally Potomac estimates were around October 2019 weren’t they?!?

Yeah mine was November last night LOL and this morning it's April-August (who knows what made me check it again... I'm neurotic?).

Considering they're processing March 2019 rn, that seems insane and I'm hoping someone has uploaded a weird timeline that has thrown the data off, hahaha. I'll make a thread about it and see if anyone knows what's happening.

Weirdly, after putting in my service centre (Potomac) in my timeline, it's showing estimated approval of April-August 2020. Which is a wide range and actually further away than Nebraska, haha. I'm hoping that estimate's not accurate!

1 hour ago, Albertobeltran said:

Update ! Received the paper notice and online access code . I don’t understand what priority date July 12.19 means though and what should I do next now that I added my case online ? Thanks. 

Just need to wait for it to process now really! You can add your timeline here by clicking 'timeline' at the side of your own post, and get an estimated approval date based on your service centre (though the IOE numbers might have thrown those estimations wildly off). 

Well, my husband just sent me a pic of the NOA1, guess we got Potomac so time to see just how fast this manages to go. 

2 hours ago, S&J2013 said:

Have we all had IOE receipt numbers? 

Looks like it, I've been keeping an eye on FB groups too.

Either every i-130 is getting an IOE now or maybe they're just going to do it for a few weeks and go back to service centre specific numbers? Hmmm. 

1 hour ago, BunyanP said:

We sent our packet in July 4th via FedEx. Received and signed on July 11th and our credit card was charged on July 15th.  Still did not get a text, or receipt number. My wife (petitioner) will try to call tomorrow and see if we can get the receipt number over the phone. 

 

How long did it take between USCIS getting your documents and getting a text to confirm?

Packet received and signed for Monday the 15th, text came on Thursday the 18th!

Not sure when credit card was charged, though. 

10 minutes ago, S&J2013 said:

I think we’re going to have to watch May and June IOE receipts for Nebraska to give us an idea of what to expect with ours.... it does seem like July is when IOE has become the norm though 😬 and not sure if that’s a good or bad thing

Agreed, I'm not sure if I'm glad or not we all got IOE numbers. Hahaha. Hopefully it's a good thing!

I saw one Nebraska case, wish I could find it again, that was approved in 3 months with IOE but I agree that I think we'll have to wait to see how the May/June cases go to get a rough timeline, because a lot more IOE numbers have been issued since...

I still don't have my service centre because no NOA1, just a text, but hopefully today or tomorrow! 

4 hours ago, S&J2013 said:

I hope you’re right! We found out today our IOE receipt was sent to Nebraska 😭

 

I’ve not found any recent people with IOE receipts that have said when they’re approved, but there does seem to be bigger surge in issuing those this month so I guess we’re going to be the ones that everyone is looking at timeline wise.

 

Oh and hello from another U.K. / USA filer 😊👋🏻

Yeah, the ones I've found are just from going through the other month filing threads to be honest, haha. There's only been a couple.

Hello and good luck!! Hopefully Nebraska won't be too hellish for you with an IOE. Can only cross our fingers.

3 hours ago, corntop said:

Yeah I've read a few different posts as well where IOE receipts are getting processed/approved in a small amount of time, but then the NVC is taking a long time to assign a case number to be able to move onto the next stage? 

 

Hopefully they are ironing out any creases in this new electronic system so that we don't get held up too long. I'm assuming we will also get an IOE receipt based on people's replies here so far, but still waiting for our text at the moment to confirm.

This is exactly what I've heard too, yup. Someone got this e-mail:

"Based on your USCIS receipt number, your case benefited from a pilot electronic process for the I-130 petition. USCIS reviewed and approved your petition faster than average cases of this type as we develop the fully electronic transfer of data from USCIS to the Department of State.  We thank you for your patience while we continue to refine our process with these electronic petitions"

Having said that, it seems like everyone in July got IOE receipt numbers, so maybe they've fully moved it over? Not sure. Did anyone file in July and not get an IOE number? Just curious!

Just now, Saryal said:

Hey ayestaci, just curious - where did you get this info from ?

Just from browsing around the forums and timelines here. Can't speak for everyone of course, just noticed the people who did mention having IOE numbers and had their NOA2 already seemed to get it within around 3 months (even one person at Nebraska). 

Hello!

I need to go fill out my timeline but I'm not sure of service centre yet, as we just got the text receipt today. I'm also an IOE number, petition was sent last Friday!
 

Seems from here a lot of the IOE numbers are taking 2.5-3 months for NOA2 at the moment? Which would be REALLY nice. Though seems much slower at NVC stage than usual... hopefully that'll be debugged by the time we get there!

1 minute ago, pushbrk said:

If he is a Union Member earning W2 income, (Quite Certain he is.) just list the union and occupation, along with applicable dates of being in the Union.  If he gets 1099 forms for his work, then he IS self employed...

Great, thank you so much! He definitely is a Union member earning W2 income, so this is absolutely what we needed to know it was fine to do. 

45 minutes ago, Wuozopo said:

I would just say self-employed film actor and not list all the specific job dates/places. You can use the additional information sheet to elaborate if you want. 

He's not an actor, he works on the crew, so he's not self-employed — he does actually have employers, I believe, so I'm worried this might count as misleading! However, I can see if there's a way he can list at least all the TV/films as one job somehow and just elaborate on them in the extra information, might be an idea. Thanks!

Hey everyone!

Firstly, VisaJourney has been such an amazing resource so far to lurk on. But now I have a specific question and after searching the forums, I can't find an answer, so I'm asking directly!

We're filing for the CR-1 visa right now (yay) after getting married in May. One of the questions on the i-130 is the petitioner's employment history.

Not a problem... except that my husband works in film & TV. In the past few months alone, I can think of 3 shows he's worked on, so it's probably 10+ a year at points. It's a long employment history and as he has tax records, it's not a problem in terms of knowing where he's worked, but the dates. We know the year. His memory is uh questionable and some of the months may be off.

I guess my question is, how big of a problem is this likely to be if a lot of the dates, especially of much shorter stints, are wild estimations (but at least we know the year?). Has anyone else dealt with a frustratingly bitty job history and come out fine?