RedAndChile

5 minutes ago, blchaddy said:

Yes, you just need to leave the SSN spot for spouse blank if you’re filing married separately. If you look at the tax forms, it actually says to only put spouse’s SSN/ITIN if you’re filing married jointly (If you file married separately, it says to leave blank)

I did some research in the finance forum here, and many filed by mail MFS, and wrote "NRA" on the SSN spot for spouse. The downpart of doing it by mail is having to wait from 6 to 8 weeks so the IRS has the transcript ready.

By software you're not usually able to do an E-File. I think there is 1 exception with one software I dont know and it's a very recent version, but its not our case it seems (her mom is an accountant as I mentioned, and couldn't do it by software). Even the people on the forum tested and concluded negatively on the software.

How long did the IRS take to have the transcript ready for you?.

Thank you!!!

Thank you everybody. It's time for us to get professional help.

Have a great week!!

1 hour ago, blchaddy said:

I don’t know if this helps..but, we filed married/separately, that way my husband didn’t have to get an ITIN/SSN. Also, for US taxes, you don’t have to report the foreign spouses income if you’re filing separately. You can also go back and amend your tax returns up to 3 years afterwards I believe, so you should be able to go back and make any corrections. 

 

I have heard stories before of issues when someone applied for spousal visa with missing tax returns —this is just some thing I’ve seen when watching Jim Hacking videos. So I don’t have first hand knowledge if that would actually be an issue, and if so if it’s minor or major. 

May I ask how you did it? You just left the identification space in blank? We're really confused, because applying for an ITIN number could be a long wait.

On 5/12/2022 at 11:19 PM, pushbrk said:

No, the mother's I-864a is as a household member of her husband.

Petitioner does not need to provide evidence she is related to her parents.  She does not need to be related to her joint sponsor.  That she is, of course, is OK, but no need for evidence of it.

 

You are saying W2 and 1040.  What is needed is a complete copy of the federal tax return(s) including all schedules, W2 forms and 1099s.

 

         OR

 

Tax Return Transcripts that can usually be downloaded from IRS.gov.  No other substitutions will do, but only the latest tax return is required.  Information from the last three is needed but only the last return or transcript copy.

 

The I-864a is used for one of two purposes.  One, to combine income.  Mother and daughter are not combining income.  Father qualifies on his own.  Second reason applies here and that is the Joint sponsor files a joint tax return with a spouse.

 

Only one copy of the 2021 tax return is needed in the joint sponsor's package, as it is a joint tax return.  Again, Mom is Dad's household member, not the Petitioner's in this context.

On 5/13/2022 at 9:33 AM, blchaddy said:

Your issue here is she didn’t file a 2021 tax return. Your wife needs to file a tax return and report her worldwide when living abroad and married to a non U.S citizen, even if she only made $10 for the year. I believe she has an automatic 2 month extension built in here since she’s abroad (so deadline would be mid June).  So definitely do that so you don’t run into trouble during the petition and interview processes. 

I'm sorry for my late response, had to travel for work the  weekend and also got really sick  . . .

About her 2021 tax return filing, we hit a big wall. She would have to file "Married" and "Separately". Her mom is an accountant and she tried to file it but had no idea how to place her foreign income in the form. And for my filing (I believe the system asks both documents to proceed), I don't even have a SSN or ITIN. Same story for filing jointly.

Today I called the NVC support phone number and the person that answered me suggested me to explain the 2021 tax filing issue and attach the other two (2019 and 2020) with the Chilean tax return attached solely to show she foreing income only. I find this scary and risky, considering your warnings about doing that.

What do you do in this case?

18 minutes ago, RedAndChile said:

I got it, I'm sorry.

 

Alright, I think I got the idea. So, here's how we pretend to organize the financial documentation:

 

- Bar coded cover sheet from payment portal (we got only 1 document with 2 bar codes, I hope that's the one)

- Cover Letter.

-  I-864 form by the Petitioner.

- Petitioner's passport ID page.

- 2019, 2020 and 2021 W2s and 1040s from the petitioner, will also include her Birth certificate to prove relationship.

- I-864 from the petitioner's father. He has the highest income (Still meets the criteria by himself) he will be the joint sponsor.

- 2019, 2020 and 2021 W2s and 1040s from the father, will also include his Birth certificate.

- I-864A from the petitioner's mother, since she is a household member. This form will be related to the father's I-864.

- 2019, 2020 and 2021 W2s and 1040s from the mother, will also include her Birth certificate.

- The parents tax return are filed jointly, hope this proves that they share the same domicile.

- Proof that the sponsor is re-establishing in the US (bank statements, Chilean temporary visa, flight tickets to the US as proof of visiting family and keeping the same domicile).

 

*The petitioner will file the 2021 tax return ASAP so we can include it. We know she'll get the late filing penalty but it's needed.

 

*I got a message today from the petitioner's family saying that they couldn't find the father's 2019 W2, but instead they could get the 2019 IT-2 summary of W2 statements and his social security income register. They still could get the 1040 for 2019. I dont know if this is accepted instead of the W-2.

 

*Also, my question about the black and white documents, is that true?.

 

Thanks a lot for your time @pushbrk , we really appreciate your help!!

Best wishes for you from Chile.

 

 

 

 

 

**I must correct, the mother's I-864A will be related to the petitioner's I-864 form.

3 minutes ago, ROK2USA said:

There is no late filing penalty for the USC if she is still residing in Chile. 

Overseas filers receive an automatic 2 month extension.

 

When to File

If you are a U.S. citizen or resident alien residing overseas, or are in the military on duty outside the U.S., on the regular due date of your return, you are allowed an automatic 2-month extension to file your return without requesting an extension. For a calendar year return, the automatic 2-month extension is to June 15. For calendar year 2021 you must pay any tax due by April 18, 2022, or interest will be charged.

WOW that's amazing!! she'll do it ASAP. Thanks so much for that!

14 hours ago, Penguin_ie said:

**** two threads on the same issue merged. Please do not ask the same question more than once, and do not ask questions about your case in another members thread *****

I got it, I'm sorry.

17 hours ago, pushbrk said:

You need to start over.  Petitioner/sponsor provides I-864.  No I-864a forms are associated with that I-864 unless the parents together don't qualify on their own,

 

Then, parent with most income provides an I-864 as joint sponsor, and the spouse provides an I-864a whether they have income or not, and whether their income is needed to qualify or not.

 

Then produce a new list for comment.

Alright, I think I got the idea. So, here's how we pretend to organize the financial documentation:

- Bar coded cover sheet from payment portal (we got only 1 document with 2 bar codes, I hope that's the one)

- Cover Letter.

-  I-864 form by the Petitioner.

- Petitioner's passport ID page.

- 2019, 2020 and 2021 W2s and 1040s from the petitioner, will also include her Birth certificate to prove relationship.

- I-864 from the petitioner's father. He has the highest income (Still meets the criteria by himself) he will be the joint sponsor.

- 2019, 2020 and 2021 W2s and 1040s from the father, will also include his Birth certificate.

- I-864A from the petitioner's mother, since she is a household member. This form will be related to the father's I-864.

- 2019, 2020 and 2021 W2s and 1040s from the mother, will also include her Birth certificate.

- The parents tax return are filed jointly, hope this proves that they share the same domicile.

- Proof that the sponsor is re-establishing in the US (bank statements, Chilean temporary visa, flight tickets to the US as proof of visiting family and keeping the same domicile).

*The petitioner will file the 2021 tax return ASAP so we can include it. We know she'll get the late filing penalty but it's needed.

*I got a message today from the petitioner's family saying that they couldn't find the father's 2019 W2, but instead they could get the 2019 IT-2 summary of W2 statements and his social security income register. They still could get the 1040 for 2019. I dont know if this is accepted instead of the W-2.

*Also, my question about the black and white documents, is that true?.

Thanks a lot for your time @pushbrk , we really appreciate your help!!

Best wishes for you from Chile.

 Hello community! Hope you're all doing great !!

So, my wife (petitioner/sponsor) lives with me in Chile since 2019. We're already on the NVC stage, we're being very careful and meticulous with the needed documentation, just like in USCIS stage.

We have this checklist that I got from VJ NVC stage help:

- Bar coded cover sheet from payment portal (we got only 1 document with 2 bar codes, I hope that's the one)

- Cover Letter.

-  I-864 form, filled by sponsor.

- Sponsor's passport ID page.

- I-864A from both household members (in this case, her parents will help us. They meet the poverty guideline criteria)

- The last three W2s of the household members, along with their 1040s.

- Proof of US Citizenship of the household members and proof of relationship (We have the sponsor's birth certificate, household members birth certificates and the household members tax returns filed jointly as a marriage, where the domicile address is shown).

- Proof of each household member residency in the same domicile (their joint tax returns and W2s show the same address, so we hope this is enough proof).

- Proof that the sponsor is re-establishing in the US (she can get bank statements, show Chilean temporary visa, flights tickets to the US as proof of visiting family and keeping the same domicile, )

- Proof that the sponsor didn't need to file tax returns, since she didn't have any income in the US (she has the Chilean Income register (pension management certificates of income) and the Temporary visa showing she has been here).

*is there any extra document she needs to upload?

*She still filed 2019 tax return (with around 1000 USD income) and 2020 tax return with 0 income. Should we still attach these documents?

*Also, I read in another thread that every document has to be in color, but the same travel.state.gov website shows documents in black and white. I only see pictures and IDs in color in their guideline. Is it ok if we have tax returns, birth certificates, even the I-864 forms or any document that is only text in black and white?.

We're really sorry for this big wall of text but it's hard to get all the answers from the website and instructions.

We appreciate your time.

Best wishes for everybody 😄

Here they show a black and white document (police record from Ecuador) :

https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/us-visas/immigrate/the-immigrant-visa-process/step-8-scan-collected-documents.html

Maybe they mean the scans for pictures for Passports, IDs. . . What do you think?

Hello mr. @pushbrk , we come in search of wisdom about the same stage, Affidavit of Support. We're applying for spousal CR-1 visa, the sponsor lives in Chile since 2019 with the beneficiary.

So, basically our question is, in I-864 form, Page 5, Part 6, item 23b. The sponsor (she) is living with the beneficiary and working in Chile, thus making no income in the USA. She had 2019 tax return filed (with around 1000 USD annual income) and 2020 tax return filed with 0 USD income. 2021 was not filed (again, 0 income).

So, if she's missing only 2021 tax return:

- Should we just not check item 23b., check "No" on 23a, and check item box 25?

- Should we still attach these tax returns?

- If we check Item box 25, would her Chilean income and Chilean temporary visa be proof of not needing to file the last three years taxes? (that's exactly the time she has been living in Chile).

We already have household members that whose income will be used to meet the poverty guideline criteria. We're just not sure about the mentioned section of the I-864.

Thank you so much for your time!!  

On 1/9/2022 at 8:52 PM, Kor2USA said:

You just have to make sure you do it between 9AM-??? EST 

Hoping you get approved soon now the holiday season is over. 

On 1/9/2022 at 9:20 PM, etrangais said:

5 to 7 mo the is processing time for Nebraska Service Center. Are you sure your case is at Nebraska service center? Even if your NOA1 came from Nebraska, your case could be elsewhere with a longer processing time, like Texas, Vermont or Cali, hence the system tells you it is within processing time

Hello everybody!

I'm sorry to give a late update about this topic.

You were right, the same day we submitted our application we were immediatly transferred to Texas Service Center. We got this info through a live agent in the online chat thats available. @Kor2USA your tip worked!!! thank you so much!!.

Now we casually checked the profile and got the "case is being actively reviewed by uscis" message, posted last tuesday in our profile!

Do you know if there's any average time after this notice?.

We're very grateful for everyone's help  

9 minutes ago, Kor2USA said:

Go to the uscis website and click on the "Ask Emma" interactive chat. I believe you can type "live agent" and they will connect you to a real person. They'll ask you to provide your question, your receipt number and then the live agent will ask you verification questions. You'll then be able to ask where your petition is being processed. 

That sounds better, thanks for the tip  , we really hope it works!

Have a great week!

23 hours ago, Kor2USA said:

A lot of times, if you file online you're automatically assigned to Nebraska. Then later (within a day or two) they decide to move you to a different processing center. 

So, your case probably wasn't transferred but assigned to another service center and your notices don't accurately state that reality.

Well that'd definitely be bad, since Nebraska has the lowest time. Do you know any way of finding out If our case was moved to another service center?.

Tomorrow we'll try calling with the "Infopass" or "Lost my receipt number" option.

Thanks! 

7 minutes ago, syedashah said:

Hi we have submitted case to NVC on 10 November still didnt hear anything. anyone have an idea how long it will take to get interview in london.

 

Well, that's just 1 month and 27 days, it usually takes a long wait, starting from 3 to 4 months as minimum depending on what kind of form and visa, check it out here to see an estimate:

 https://egov.uscis.gov/processing-times/

input your basic data and see the ranges.

2 hours ago, Crazy Cat said:

Appears to be down at this time.

Yes!, it's still down.

2 hours ago, JeanneAdil said:

In the inquiry 

post the following:

Case # 

both names

and both DOB's

 

most inquiries get genertic replys with little or no real information

it may say something like this:   case is not out of normal processing times

or 

case is actively being reviewed 

but the above tell u nothing of real value

We'll try again with this. Never thought of putting both names Thank you!.

1 hour ago, Chancy said:

*** Moved from IR1/CR1 Process & Procedures to IR1/CR1 Progress Reports ***

 

 

Your petition was probably transferred to another service center with a longer estimated processing time.  Happened to us and many others here on VJ.  We were not notified that our petition had been transferred.  We found out about the transfer only after 7 months when we called the USCIS hotline to ask about our case.

 

Try calling again to ask where your petition is currently assigned.  Say "lost receipt" or "InfoPass" at the voice prompts to be connected to a human agent.

 

Holy canelloni that sounds terrifying, how can we know earlier if we were transferred? I thought the website would let you know, at least with a little delay.

We just called customer service and the voice is different (it's not a lady anymore, it's a man), tried the Infopass and almost worked, but they don't work on the weekends, so we'll try again next week. Thank you!!

Hello everybody!

Hope this post finds you all well .

My wife and I are trying to submit an inquiry about our case, since it's out of regular processing time, according to the website: https://egov.uscis.gov/processing-times/ . 

So, our data is:

- Receipt date: 06/01/2021.

- Form: I-130, US Citizen filing for a spouse.

- Service Center: Nebraska (according to our receipt notice, bottom left of the document).

- Current receipt date for a case inquiry at the moment of this post is: June 12th 2021. (range is: 4 to 7 months)

Everytime we try to submit the inquiry we get the "Your application or petition is currently within the posted processing times. An inquiry may not be created at this time."

Our receipt date is before the current receipt date for a case inquiry posted, we should be able to submit it (it's been over 7 months already).

We're very confused. We even called the USCIS customer service (1-800-375-5283), and the automated phone system is really a nightmare (confuses numbers when you say your receipt number or doesn't do anything if you dial it), then tells you to check the website.

So we're wonderign: has anyone had this issue?, what might be the problem?, if you had this issue, how did you solve it?

Post data: https://my.uscis.gov/ is down right now.

Thanks!!!!!

2 hours ago, pushbrk said:

Most likely "Action" is that they assigned the case to a service center.

Thanks a lot! 😁

1 minute ago, Nitas_man said:

Cashed the check probably.  You months away from meaningful action

I was charged immediatly in my credit card. I guess it was just a delayed answer from the system.

Thanks for the answer!

Thanks for the info! we thought the recepit document was the NOA1 only. 😂

Hello,

We filed online for CR-1 visa on june 1st 2021, and after 2 days we got an email saying "We have taken an action on your case". We checked the website and nothing has changed.

What could this mean? I find it strange since it's very early.

Thanks!!! 😄

Hello everyone!

We are Elizabeth (petitioner) and Simon (beneficiary), currently living abroad in Chile. We actually filed June 1st 2021, I know it shouldn't go in this topic, but had nowhere to share our process hahaha 😆. Our timeline goes:

Marriage: 04/16/2021

Case filed (online): 06/01/2021

NOA1: 06/01/2021

Nebraska Service Center

Today we got an email from USCIS saying "We have taken an action on your case" (not completely sure what this means) it's been a couple of days so we're a little bit confused. We checked  https://my.uscis.gov/ website and nothing has changed yet. This seems to be pretty common, we've read that is a delay on the system and wait for some days.

Much appreciated Troy!😁

Hello everyone,

This is our first post. We are Simón (Chile) and Elizabeth (USA).

We were organizing all the documents that we're going to submit for the online I-130, and noticed that the I-130A form that we were using was due to 2/28/2021.

So, we checked the USCIS website to see if there was a recent version and the only document available is the same outdated one. Even the I-130 USCIS web (https://my.uscis.gov/), at evidence of support section has a link to this outdated form.

Here we paste what it says in the website (https://www.uscis.gov/i-130) :

USCIS published new form editions for affected forms. Starting April 19, 2021, we will only accept the 03/10/21 editions. Until then, you can also use the prior editions specified on each form webpage.

We are confused and don't want to have our process denied.

If anyone has information we would be thankful.