stegsaurus

Hi all, My wife and I got married in January, filed our AOS packet at the end of March, and have our AOS interview scheduled for Nov 12. Our final AOS packet, as prepared by our lawyer, was nearly 300 pages (including all forms and evidence we submitted). We've had an interview prep session with our lawyer, as well as with another lawyer at the immigration law firm where my wife now works, and they've both stated that we should have an easy interview because we submitted so much proof with our initial case. Despite this, I still want to be very prepared, of course. While I took all the steps I could think of to have proof with our initial filing (adding her as an authorized user to all my credit cards, screenshots of all accounts where she's a family member, lots of photos, etc.) we have plenty of additional proof from the last ~7 months. This includes new photos, WhatsApp communication, remittances to her family, utility bills, and pay stubs from both of us. My current concern is the number of pages we'd be bringing to the interview with the recommended 6 months of financial statements for all institutions. I have five different credit cards (I use them for rewards and never carry a balance) and two bank accounts. Even with cutting out the extraneous informational pages from the statements, the last 6 months' of our primary bank statements alone are about 20 pages. If I print those statements for all credit cards and accounts, we're going to have over 100 pages just of statements. This seems excessive when our lawyer recommended 30-60 pages of new evidence. I'm worried about not having something we need, but I also don't want to be overkill. I also don't want to struggle to quickly find a particular document or set of documents the officer may ask for during the interview. Would you recommend I print it all and do my best to keep it split up, or focus only on the accounts we use the most? Also, does the 6 month recommended period also apply to utility bills? The only ones of those I can add a spouse to are our internet and electricity bills, and I was going to do two statements for each of them to cut down on paper.

They gave her a sheet of paper that said "your visa has been approved" (in Spanish) and told her she should have her visa in a week, so I'd say that's as close to officially legally "yes" as possible. I suppose something could still change, though that's all I need at this point. That's why I'm waiting until she has her visa in hand to book anything.

I believe they called her from the same Honduran embassy number, but I'm not sure -- I can ask her and report back. She doesn't have her visa in-hand yet, but she was approved after a very short interview on Thursday. They said she should expect her visa in about a week, so with Thanksgiving (not sure if that will affect it), I'm hoping for her to have it this Friday, at which point we're going to book her trip to come here. I was worried about the medical exam expiring too, so I understand that concern. Did they comment on that either way? As long as the pre-interview is before, it should hopefully be fine. It's so frustrating what's happened here and costed people so much time/stress.

That was my thought too -- the squeaky wheel and all that. If you keep making enough noise, hopefully they'll get sick of hearing about it and fix it.

This is how I contacted the White House: https://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/request/ I did so twice; the first time I put "NVC" and the second time I used "Embassy". I think this must have been what made the difference

Hello all, Per the issue I explained in this thread, my fiancée and I had an issue where she was not allowed into her interview on Oct 17 because she never went to the pre-interview, which they never let us know about. She has just called me with great news: the embassy rescheduled her pre-interview for this Thursday (Nov 14) and then her interview will be next Thursday, Nov 21. I'm so relieved! But I want to make sure I have something right. Because we didn't know when the pre-interview would be the first time around, we completed and signed all the documents for her interview (my I-134, our updated letters of intent to marry, employment verification letter, etc.) around Oct 5-7. I want to make sure my I-134 and supporting letters from my banks would still be valid now, about a month later. I can easily grab the more recent pay stubs that have been issued since, and I could probably get another letter from my main bank tomorrow if needed. However, I use an online service called Betterment for my HYSA and investing, and that letter took several days to generate when I did it the first time so I couldn't have a new one ready on such short notice. The simplest thing would be to leave everything alone so the amounts on my I-134 match what's on my existing letters without scrambling to fix it in one day, and I'm sure she can explain this to the officers if needed. I don't think a month is too large a gap considering the circumstances, but I also don't want to take any chances given the issues we had last time. I appreciate any advice on this. Thank you!

My fiancée just called me to tell me the embassy called her and scheduled an appointment! Her pre-interview will be this Thursday and then her interview will be next Thursday. This is so much sooner than I was expecting, and I'm so relieved. I don't know if it was the White House inquiry that did it or what, but I'm so happy!

@Myfam1st Thank you for that number -- my fiancée found a list of call center numbers a bit ago and this was one of them. Apparently the numbers 2262-0246 through 2262-0251 are all call center numbers. I believe she's called them all, but I'll double-check to see if she's called this one. Did you call it, and what were your results if so? I've called the main embassy Honduran number (2236-9320) a few times myself and don't get any useful info. When I talk to anyone on the phone, they tell me they aren't a consulate and can't look into specific cases. They tell me to email these various addresses, which always leads to no response.

Thank you for this -- I haven't come across this page before. I was going to try step 2 first, but when it looks like this page is intended for people in Washington DC to add complaints about the embassies of other countries. I'll email the general-purpose email to ask if I can use it for this purpose and see what we get.

I'll give them a try, but I doubt anything will come of it. Thanks for letting me know.

What number/email did you get an actually helpful answer from? I feel like I've tried everything and get the same runaround nothing answers.

Were you already aware of that name error on your end, or was it brought to your attention to the first time just now? I ask because I still have an inkling of a feeling that the Case Number field missing from my fiancée's profile on the new visa provider site may play a role here, but I can't get a clear answer about it and it's not a user-editable field. ----- One of the people I've been messaging on Reddit told me at 11:53 AM (Eastern) today they were able to get an appointment. They said there were slots open for Dec 19th and 20th. But they aren't on a K1 visa -- they are on an F11 with IR2 priority. I was (of course) out until about noon so I didn't see this while it was happening. I have been refreshing since then haven't seen anything. I'm going to keep checking and really hope I did not just miss our chance. I also just got a response from the honduras.visas@gdit-gss.com address that said: More useless nonsense. I am ready to lose it from the runaround I am getting. Nobody can give you a single clear answer or offer you any help.

That's so frustrating; I hate this bureaucracy nonsense. Nobody ever takes responsibility for their mistakes and you cannot get ahold of anyone close to the people who have screwed you up. They've mentioned to me that new dates are regularly added too, but that's not an answer when dates haven't been added in over a month. We had no problem picking a date back in August -- do they treat the end of the year like a dead end and not add any appointments for 2025 until the year rolls over, or something? That would be silly. I also had thought about what you mentioned with the "system busy" message being a glitch. I just got off the phone with the embassy's US number again (first time I've called in two weeks). I didn't get any new useful info, but here's a summary: "System is busy" shows both because there are no available dates and because there's been "heavy traffic" since Sept 23. Per this page, that's the day the new system was rolled out. There's no way that there was coincidentally a huge influx of requests on the same day as a new system, so this tells me that the new system is broken. honduras.visas@gdit-gss.com is only for the support team -- this address does not go directly to the embassy. I was advised to visit usembassy.gov or cbp.gov to contact someone there, or "call the Honduras local embassy" because the number I called (703-831-3391) is a third-party that only helps with scheduling. I asked if they are in Honduras, Washington DC, or what and they wouldn't tell me. To avoid the pre-interview problem in the future, I need to go to NVC webpage and contact them. They are in charge of the pre-interviews but the rep was not sure how. The reason why my case shows as updated on Oct 31 is that the NVC or embassy could be reviewing my case and may send me the pre-interview info by mail or email soon, so I should keep an eye out. I guess the last point makes me feel a bit better, though I still have that "adrift" feeling of having no idea who to turn to. Apparently, there's basically no option for contacting the actual embassy, which for a citizen is absurd.

@HondurasK1help I don't see an inquiry form on my computer on the page you mention, and I don't see it on my phone either. Is it perhaps the NVC one? I sent an inquiry using this a bit ago and received a response that they handed off my case to the embassy so I need to talk to the embassy for further info. So unfortunately, I don't think that's going to be a help. The last time I called the embassy (I think it was the Honduran number), I was told that "system is busy" appears when there are no appointments. I don't know if that's true, but if so, this error is way too vague. This system is also a huge step down from the prior one -- under that one, as soon as you logged in, you'd see a "Next appointment date is XYZ" on the sidebar, which was super useful. It doesn't seem possible that they have had no appointment slots available for a month straight. On the old system, we booked at the end of August and the first available was Oct 17. I might call again today but I don't expect anything to change. They tell you to email when you call, and then they ignore the emails. And meanwhile our lives are on hold here. @KMG I'm not trying to be dense, but which number specifically do you mean? I see a number for emergencies, which seems inappropriate for this, and this isn't a passport service issue. Did you call the number under Urgent Travel Service? The form at the bottom says not to use it for visa questions, so I imagine they'll ignore anything I send through there. Interestingly, when I used the CEAC checker just now, it says that our case was last updated on Oct 31 (last time I checked, it said Oct 17, which was the day of her interview). I wonder what they are updating on our case when we haven't gotten anywhere with it during all this time?

I haven't gotten much movement since I last posted here. I let my senator's office know the embassy's response wasn't helpful because it didn't address the pre-interview issue, so they sent a follow-up that I haven't heard back on yet. My other senator got back to me but said it can delay things if more than one congressional inquiry is sent for the same issue, so they aren't going to send one unless I ask them to once the process with the other senator concludes. I haven't gotten anything back on any of the embassy emails I sent. I tried using the White House's "help with a federal agency form" and got nothing back. I sent an inquiry to the NVC and got a response that once they hand the case off to the embassy, I need to contact the embassy instead. I suppose I can call the embassy number again, but I never get anywhere when I do. The way they talk to you, it's as if you're calling Walmart's 1-800 number and asking about some problem in your local store. They tell me they can't give details, but who else can give me details if not them? Someone told me the "system is busy" message means there are no appointments available, and my fiancée said another girl has been trying to schedule since Oct 3 and has gotten this every time. I've tried 5-10 times per day since Oct 18 and I get that message every time too. I heard there might be appointments that open up on Nov 1, so I checked at midnight Honduras time but it was still busy. It's been two weeks of this but it feels like two months. It's exhausting. My fiancée wants me to come see her in the meantime, which of course I want to, but the thought of having to spend a few thousand dollars on a trip that I should not have to take because I should have been going to get her this coming week makes me sick. This is wearing on both of us and I am so upset that these people are putting us through this with no recourse. They won't even apologize for putting your life's plans off track by months, let alone refund your application fee or anything like that. We have to re-prepare documents, spend more money, and so much else because of this. @KMG Do you have a recommended contact page/email/etc. for the Dept of State directly? When I go to a page like this, it essentially tells you to contact the nearest embassy. The NVC won't help at this stage.