Pirozhok

I haven't heard such advice, but I can see the logic here. Visas are issued for a specific purpose, and if you are getting for example a Hungarian tourist visa it should be (at least primarily) for a trip to Hungary for the purpose of tourism. According to consular bureaucrats if your primary intent is to go to Poland you should get a Polish visa. The fact that you can't get a Polish visa is your problem, not theirs. You should read the list of requirements on the embassy's website, but AFAIK they normally do require a return ticket.

Why are you trying to transfer? You are going to get rejected by most other countries. Warsaw is your best option. Just get a visa to Hungary and take the train from Budapest to Warsaw. 

open a schengen for hungary, that's what i did for my wife, we currently live in st.petersburg, there is a visa center that helps you get the docs, got our approval within 10/14 business days, then we went to our interview in poland..

Hello, I want to reach out again and ask if anyone has any advice or guidance on how I can expect to hear from the Polish embassy (Will it be via email, physical letter and will it be sent to me in the US or my fiancee in Russia)? Also am I already able to schedule an appointment? I don't want to waste any time obviously and waiting on this is stalling everything else in the process (Schengen visa, Europe travel plans, travel plans to the US, etc)

I wanted to give folks who were having the same difficulties as we were some insight that worked perfectly for us. From the welcome letter from the Warsaw embassy, they indicate the approved medical exam locations, we chose this one. They were friendly, efficient, and explained all of the costs and what would be needed, and regularly do these medical exams for the Embassy so they know exactly what is needed.
 
For us this worked out very well, because of our ages, she only needed to have the X-Ray for TB test done at an offsite X-Ray place ( rentgen.pl ) no appointment necessary. So because of this, we went to get the X-Ray, they told us it would be ready in 3-4 hours. 3-4 hours later we showed back up picked up our X-Ray and then drove to the clinic.
 
We had the sealed envelope for our interview ready by the time we left the office. Our case was a little different because she did not need a blood or urine test. If these tests are required, it takes several days to get those results, but those tests can all be done at the same place that does the X-Ray.
 
Basically our plan was this:
 
1. Fiancée applied for Schengen visa to Hungary 4 weeks out
2. We both flew into Budapest
3. Rented a car, drove to Warsaw ( about 8 hours or so ) : NO ISSUES with BORDER CONTROL !
4. Stayed in Warsaw while waiting for our Medical Exam appointment and Visa Interview

I hope this helps and folks find this useful.
 
Curt
 
 
 

I'm curious if anyone has a good answer to this specific question? It seems like with visa windows shortening and the US visa process being so open-ended with timeframes, it's had to come up before, right?

Adding another to the list. She's partial to the meals on Turkish Airlines anyway, so we just start on their website directly. There really aren't enough options to save much by shopping around at this point anyway.

Adding another to the list. She's partial to the meals on Turkish Airlines anyway, so we just start on their website directly. There really aren't enough options to save much by shopping around at this point anyway.

Adding another to the list. She's partial to the meals on Turkish Airlines anyway, so we just start on their website directly. There really aren't enough options to save much by shopping around at this point anyway.

Adding another to the list. She's partial to the meals on Turkish Airlines anyway, so we just start on their website directly. There really aren't enough options to save much by shopping around at this point anyway.

Everyone I know who travels between Russia and the US (or Europe) these days goes via Istanbul. Would check with Turkish Airlines and see if you have luck.

For us (K-1 interview June 2022), it took about 3 business days for it be delivered to the MBE office in Warsaw for pick-up. I agree, however, that you cannot bank on an immediate approval as there are unfortunate examples of long Administrative Processing. 

Hi guys,
 
My fiancee (from Russia) is having her K1 interview at the Warsaw embassy on 4/29.  We are trying to plan our trip to the U.S. and trying to approximate the time it should take to get the visa back.  On their site it says 3-5 business days after the interview, but when I emailed their support they said they cannot provide an estimate.  Has anyone gotten the K1 visa from Warsaw recently and how long after the interview did it take you?  Planning the trip back after 7 business days but worried that might not be enough.   Thanks in advance for any responses.

It's been a couple months, how about now? We had a delay going to NVC thanks to a clerical error on the USCIS's part, but hopefully not too much longer until we have a date and she's applying for a visa. 
 
The Forum Vinskogo suggestion is interesting, as that's actually where I saw people suggestion Hungary back in October. It seemed to make sense, which is why I was wondering if there's something the folks here knew as to why Greece/Italy would be preferable to Hungary.

Hello all! Long time lurker, first time posting so please forgive any weird formatting and my litany of questions!
 
My husband is Russian and his case is currently assigned to Warsaw. We just got DQ'd today and we're awaiting the interview email.
 
We have seen many people on this forum successfully transfer to Almaty or Bishkek but we would like to know what documents you provided to facilitate the transfer? Which embassy (Almaty or Bishkek) has been more accepting of Russian IR1/CR1 transfers? Have some of you needed to go ahead and get denied for a Schengen visa to Poland to prove the applicant can't attend the interview there? Or would this email from the Polish Embassy in Saint Petersburg (attached) suffice for the Almaty and/or Bishkek embassies? What other hardship did you show to demonstrate the need for the transfer? 
 
Also, how long did it take for the transfer to happen and how long after did you receive your interview date (and when was that interview date from when you got transferred)? Did you do the medical exam in Moscow or did it need to be done in Almaty or Bishkek?
 
Sorry for so many confusing questions but I hope that someone could provide some advice and that this thread can help others in the same situation! 
 
Thank you all for your help!
 

My fiance has an interview date! It's at the end of February!

We've had such trouble with this scheduling stage and I had been unable to find anything helpful on the internet or on this forum, so I want to leave my experience here for anyone else who may go through it.
 
My fiance is Russian and our case was originally sent to Warsaw. We transferred our case to Jerusalem and at the end of September we finally got the email saying the embassy received our documents and they were ready for us to schedule the interview by going to https://ais.usvisa-info.com/en-il/iv/users/sign_in. When we first tried to schedule, there were no appointments and you can't pay your fee if there isn't an appointment. After a week or two, finally they released appointment dates. When you are ready to pay you get sent to the Hyp CreditGuard page when you put in your card info and pay. However, every time we tried, we got a message saying "Payment Failed! Refusal. Use alternative method." We tried multiple cards but nothing worked. We also received a message after several tries that said "There was a problem processing your payment. You may have been charged. Please contact support. Do not attempt to pay again." They listed a contact page (https://ais.usvisa-info.com/en-il/iv/information/contact_us) with an email for payment issues, which I emailed. Absolutely useless. In one reply they did confirm that my payment hadn't gone through, but all other communications were copy-and-paste pre-written messages that didn't relate to anything I wrote. All of the appointments were taken in less than 24 hours and we missed the opportunity.
 
I saw there is an option to pay in cash at the Israeli Postal Bank, but you have to physically go there and pay, then you come back to the portal and upload a receipt before the system considers it paid, then it will let you through to the scheduling calendar. Neither of us are in Israel right now, so that wasn't an option for us.
 
Then the war in Gaza started and they announced they were no longer processing visas and cancelling appointments. We've checked several times per day every day anyway and only twice during October and November did any appointments appear. I suspect they were cancellations because they were only a week or two away from the date I saw them. We tried to pay anyway, but no luck. I emailed the visa section of the embassy and asked if they had any plans to restart visa appointments again and they told me they may release new dates in January and we should keep checking the portal.
 
At this point I discovered that you can schedule by phone too. I don't know how I missed this earlier, but I called and confirmed that they can take your credit card over the phone and then schedule you. There were no dates at that time, so they told me to keep checking the portal.
 
Finally in the beginning of December at least one February appointment appeared (before you pay, the portal will only tell you the soonest appointment available. There may be other dates but you can't see them or know how many until after you pay). This time I had a new card. All previous attempts had been with Mastercards, but my new card was a Visa card. This time it worked! No issues at all! I don't know if being Mastercard was the problem or not, but there is nothing that says they don't accept them. There were three spots available and we chose end of February. It's good we didn't take an earlier date in February due to the medical exam. After scheduling the visa appointment, we scheduled the medical exam. All of the December, January and early February dates had been filled up, so the mid February date worked well for us.
 
I want to celebrate, but I know there are still big hurdles to overcome yet. My fiance will have to enter Israel and it seems their border control is as strict and hard to cross as the US border control. The embassy could also put him in administrative processing. And then there's possible escalation of the war and it's complications. So I'm (very) cautiously optimistic.

And I thought single entry meant you could go to any of them, provided you didn't leave the Schengen territory.

1. Enter with your American fiancé or family member when travelling to Israel because they're more likely to trust your story this way. We had no additional screening when entering the country together.
2. Try to avoid transfers to or through Turkey/Qatar/other Muslim-majority countries. 
3. Regarding medical, I would try to do it in Jerusalem. We did our medical in Bethlehem and we didn't know Bethlehem was West Bank (after all, the name is in Hebrew and it's right next to the capital). They didn't like this at all. The other options are Gaza and Ramallah and these are probably worse. 
4. Interviews are available online and update regularly. Just keep checking back is my advice.
5. I would recommend just keeping your passport with you. Someone gave it to the embassy and is/was rapidly losing money waiting in Israel for it back. 
6. Israel is a very diverse country so you should have no issues finding English, Russian, Hebrew, or Arabic interviewers if you let them know ahead of time. 
7. Checkpoints happen regularly and transit can be severely disrupted this way. You could, for example, be barred from travelling between East and West Jerusalem, Bethlehem and Jerusalem, etc. We travelled to each location a day in advance so we would be able to walk to the interview/medical if vehicles were not available. There are hotels you can book for 1 night next to the embassy and near the medical. 

Spain accepted us but only single-entry. We were also considering Greece and Italy but decided on Spain because of processing times.

My fiance and I were able to successfully transfer our case to Jerusalem. On this forum people are saying it's the only embassy that will take Russians right now. It was the first one we tried. It took about month for the transfer to process after they confirmed they would take the case. Now we're wait for appointments. When we log into the portal to schedule an interview, it literally says that there are no appointments available and that we should check back later. Absolutely no indication of when more appointments will be available.

Yep, I read up on your situation after joining too (new to the site and just getting settled in as I prepare to sort all this out for us). I didn't ask only because you've been active and seem to be updating us all as things unfold already.
 
I was actually hoping that other countries might be open to taking the rejected Schengen into account too. I'm not opposed to going to Jerusalem, but it seems like so much of this stuff is on the whim of whomever is working at the consulate and changes by the week and I'm a bit worried that they currently seem like the only real option.  OP seemed open to any other country, so was hoping to see if they maybe found luck elsewhere too.