jalevy03

I believe they mean something unexpected might come up. Maybe your wife is hospitalised, maybe you are hospitalised, or some other emergency comes up which may threaten your wife's LPR status. That's why I said that for a trip lasting that close to 12 months, a re-entry permit would be a really good idea.

Ok, I understand. Thanks so much for your help with this. Hopefully it works out. Our dates are flexible, so I'll probably just try to tighten up the trip to 10 months or so in case we need the extra cushion.

Advice: Get it

Unfortunately we applied for one in August. Didn't get it until January. Don't leave until you do the fingerprinting - have it sent to consulate. If she fails the fingerprint and has to go back in (my wife failed) it's a setback. My wife failed fingerprints, then it got lost in the mail, then we had to file for a new one and get ANOTHER set of prints. It was a real mess.

11 months is pushing it. Don't do it.

What does "pushing it" mean? We absolutely won't be out of the country for more than a year.

I am a worrier too. Which is why I surprised myself when I didn't get an I-131. I think preparing for a trip abroad for research/study is enough without having to worry about things like this, which is why it probably slipped our minds!

I will have to pass on the Guam question to someone else as i'm not sure of the set up.

I wish you luck with your research. I have doctoral research set to begin in the US as soon as I get ethical approval and my new visa!

That's so true! I've been squirreled away in the archive for months and figuring out all sorts of doctor's appointments and preparations. This one just slipped through the cracks. Good luck with your research as well!

Any GC holder outside of the US for 6 months must be given additional scrutiny on their entry back into the US. I was told about the re-entry permit for trips of 6 months or more being a good idea by a US immigration lawyer/friend of mine.

If you do not have time to get a reentry permit, just be prepared to have proof -- which it sounds like you have. Before a year, the worst that can happen (I believe) is that your wife is given a court date to see an immigration judge to determine if the trip was temporary -- which it clearly is. She will be allowed to be in the country during that time and the fact that she's accompanying you abroad will likely go a long way. It's just a bit of a headache.

If you end up there for over a year, you can pay for a waiver at the border if the immigration officer offers one.

I wouldn't stress too much. Just be prepared for questioning.

Thanks for this. That's very helpful. I'm just a bit of a worrier, and normally I'd be on top of this -- but as it happened I remembered the part about picking up the I-131 at a foreign embassy and forgot the part about the biometrics. We'll prepare as much as we can for further questions.

There is one more little thing. We're making a short stopover in Guam around month 9 of the trip -- either a few hours to transit to Japan or a few days to do some additional research. Will USCIS in Guam be likely to let us pass through without too much trouble, or should we be prepared to go through questioning both in Guam and when we get back to the mainland?

If you failed to attend the biometrics then only the I-131 would be denied, and you would forfeit the fee.

I realize it would have been safer had we started this a few weeks ago, but as it stands I'm not really inclined to spend more than $400 on the possibility that we'd be able to get a biometrics appointment (and why can't they use the other three we've already done?) on the possibility that our evidence of maintaing residency won't be accepted. We'll absolutely be back in the US in less than one year -- we wouldn't risk staying out longer. Is there anything else we can do now to help this along?

Also, should we be filing an AR-11 once we're out of country? I notice you can indicate a temporary visit, and that the Federated States of Micronesia is listed along with all of the US states (the FSM is freely associated with the US, but it's an independent nation). Would it help to indicate on the AR-11 that our overseas address is temporary?

With a timeline that close, obtaining a re-entry permit would, I think, be a really good idea.

The problem will be that even if you applied tomorrow, you may not receive a biometrics appointment before you leave the US. You could have the re-entry permit itself sent to a US post overseas without issue, but if you failed to attend the biometrics then it would be automatically denied.

And as stated by the poster above, as soon as you're outside of the US for 365 days without a re-entry permit then your green card is essentially gone, in the overwhelming majority of cases.

If we were to get assigned a biometrics appointment after August 6 and the application was denied, would that impact our ability to come back into the country? And I assume we'd lose the entire fee in that case?

I just accidentally abandoned my green card by studying abroad. I paid US taxes, am studying on a Federal student loan and my only bank accounts are still open in the US. I'm also married to a US citizen and have a US citizen child.

I was in the UK for over a year when I found out, but not much more than a year. I was told that you should always have one for trips over 6 months long. However, if you do return after less than a year your wife will likely be okay if you make sure you have proof that it was only temporary.

Best of luck.

That's scary stuff! Can I ask who told you you should always have an I-131 for trips over 6 months?

We'll have a letter from my department, taxes paid in the US, a US driver's license for her, US bank accounts, something indicating that all of our stuff is in storage in Illinois, and hopefully a letter or two from the US/Japanese embassies in Micronesia. We'll also definitely be abroad for less than a year. Is there anything else we can do?

Also, we'll be transiting through Guam about a month before we come back to the mainland -- possible staying there for a week. That doesn't impact the rest of this, does it?

Hi everyone,

Sorry to rehash this question, but I'm still a bit confused on when to apply for an I-131 reentry permit. My wife is a green card holder, and she got her 10-year card in 2010. We'll be spending about 11 months in Micronesia and Japan for research for my graduate program. It seems to me that it's fairly clear we don't intend to relocate permanently. I can get documentation from my university stating the trip is temporary, we have all of our things in storage in Illinois, we'll continue to pay US taxes, and so on. But would it still be wise to apply for an I-131? Time is a bit short now (we've leaving the country on August 6), and I realize I should have gotten to this sooner. But I'd appreciate any guidance here. Thanks!

Hi everyone,

I'm a U.S. citizen, and my wife is a Japanese citizen with a 10-year green card. I'm in a graduate program, and need to travel abroad for about nine months next year for some research.

I know that a re-entry permit isn't required for travel of less than one year, but that USCIS can also consider residency to have been abandoned for shorter periods of travel than that. What kind of evidence can we prepare (or what else can we do) to minimize difficulties on re-entry? Would a letter from my university stating the temporary nature of my travel be helpful? We won't be "maintaining a residence" if that means keeping an empty house (we rent), but we will have a large amount of furniture, etc. in storage. Would some evidence of that be helpful? I'll continue to be affiliated with my (U.S.) university, and obviously we'll continue paying U.S. taxes. Is there anything else we can do?

Thanks!

Great answers, everyone -- thanks.

Unfortunately, Japan doesn't allow dual citizenship. If it did, that would solve all of our problems. My wife wouldn't be able to work for this volunteer organization in the first place if she wasn't a Japanese citizen anymore.

But otherwise, I think we can figure this out. Thanks again for all of your help with this.

Hmm... any rough estimates as to the time between submitting the application and the biometrics? Maybe it'd be possible to spend some time at my parents' house, submit the second I-131 immediately, and then take off right after the biometrics? I'm imagining that'd be at least a month -- which means that cutting the trip a bit short would probably be easiest.

Or: for the first I-131, we'd submit the application, get the biometrics, and then be able to leave right after, right? How long before leaving the country should we send in the application, just to be safe? And if we were to pick up the I-131 at the US embassy in Micronesia after being abroad for a month or two, would that actually buy us a little extra time? Say, two months of waiting plus 24 months from the date of issuance?

A re-entry permit can be renewed, but as you say, your wife would have to be physically in the United States when she makes the application for the second permit and would have to stick around long enough to have her biometrics taken as part of the application process. She wouldn't have to remain until the permit is actually issued, though; arrangements can be made to pick it up from US consular posts abroad.

And I suppose it's not possible to renew the re-entry permit? My wife would have to be in the United States to apply for it, and I'm sure it takes a few months to be approved, right?

Hi everyone,

My wife has a ten-year green card. We've been living in the U.S. since 2008. I'm a graduate student and I need to travel to the Federated States of Micronesia for some fieldwork. The research itself will take about a year, but we were hoping my wife could get a two-year appointment with a Japanese version of the Peace Corps that operates in Micronesia (it's called JICA).

I know we need a re-entry permit if she's gone for more than a year and up to two years -- but it's possible the program will last 25 months with training. Does the re-entry permit start counting down from the date of issuance, meaning that we might miss the deadline by a few months? Should we try to negotiate a shorter term from the Japanese government? Is it at all possible that a visit to Guam or Hawai'i somewhere in there could help? Or maybe we should stick to a year abroad without her working? Thoughts?

Thanks for your help!

Thanks for responding! I assume that if we were to live in Canada for seven years and then come back to the U.S., we'd do it under an IR1 visa? It looks like we'd still have to do the long drawn-out I-130 first, but isn't there a visa that she could get as the wife of someone working in the U.S. so that she could live here while we waited for the forms to go through but perhaps not be able to work herself? It seems a little silly to be planning out this far in advance, but I want to make sure getting her back into the country won't be impossible. I'm not sure if I'll even end up working here!

Hi everyone,

My wife is a Japanese citizen who entered on U.S. in July of 2008 on a K1 fiancee visa. We received her conditional permanent residency card this past winter. I'm in the middle of researching Ph.D. programs, a few of which are in Canada. They would start in the fall of 2010, before we'd be able to apply to have the conditions on her permanent residency removed. If a Canadian program turned out to the best fit for us and we ended up in Vancouver or Toronto for five to seven years, what would the process for her if I wanted to return to the United States to work after I got my degree? Would we have to do all the preliminary paperwork for a marriage visa from the beginning? Would we go back to conditional permanent residency, still having to wait two years to get the conditions removed? Or would some other kind of visa be better?

Thanks for your help!

Wow, that's a lot to think about. Thanks for your help everyone! I guess I'll just leave it like it is and not rock the boat. Hopefully it'll work itself out.

I just sent in an I-485 form and I-765 form for my wife, who is a Japanese citizen in the US on a K-1 fiancee visa. After reading some other posts, I now realize that I should have written her eligibility status as ©(9) rather than (a)(6) under question #16. How should I let USCIS know about my mistake? Should I send another I-765 to the Chicago lockbox with a cover letter asking them to disregard the previous form? I just sent the packet yesterday, and it hasn't even arrived yet. Or would it be better to try to get someone on the phone or go to a local USCIS service center? I tried to e-file the I-765, but the system said I had to pay an extra $340, which I don't think I need to do if I'm filing I-765 concurrently with I-485. Thanks for your help!