ARTY AND LILI

I know that this topic is old, but here is what is important. The letter, along with the expired green card, are your ticket INTO the united states. There is no guarantee that a country that normally grants a green card holder the same rights as a citizen will allow entry with the letter. You should check with the embassy of that country.

I'm not sure if I'm posting this in the correct area or not. Has anyone ever tried to visit the U.S. after a K1 visa was issued but the marriage didnt take place? Not trying to stay in the U.S. ONLY visit. My fiance left way before the 90 day period to be married would have been up. There was a family emergency and he left urgently. Because of the situation at home we don't want to refile any paper until we know for sure he will be able to get here and not have any further issues prior to receiving the advance parole. We haven't seen each other in 5 months and we just really are looking forward to the visit but I can't help but worry about that visa being in the passport and him going through immigration and them saying NO WAY BUDDY! LOL. Any input would be greatly appreciated. He's been here several times, never overstayed.

The fact that someone comes on a K1 visa and returns home in a timely manner demonstrates a commitment to obey US immigration laws. This can have a favorable outcome if handled properly. It might depend on the type of visa that you apply for.

I visited my fiancee 9 times in 2008, never any questions, never any hassle. It's usually the US that questions people coming into the country with suspicion. The only limitation on entry for a US citizen is the maximum number of days per visit, which I believe is 30. We got married in 2008, which cut down my travel costs quite a bit....

My wife received her green card in April with the stamp inside her passport expiring in April, 2010, but the Green Card issued for the standard two years. When we were leaving, the agent said that we needed to file another form before the 1 year anniversary of the card, but we can't find anything that states this. Does anyone know what needs to be filed one year after the green card is issued, if it is anything at all?

Thanks!

Your fiancee will specifically be asked the question, "Have you ever received US government public assistace." It will come down to your conscience as to where to split hairs here.

If you can, avoid getting government assistance. If you can't, health comes first.

You are going to need the sponsor as mentioned, but it is a little hard to argue that she hasn't been a public charge if you receive government assistance that she is the beneficiary of.

The question is, are you legally married? Some cultures have separate civil and religious marriages, and in some consulates if the religious is complete and the legal component is imcomplete, you are not married. It really depends on the jurisdiction and the law of the country. In order to apply for a K1 visa, both of you need to be "free to be married". If that is no longer the case, make certain that you complete the legal portion of your marriage if appropriate and file for a K3 or CR1 visa. It depends very much on the laws of the country you are in and whether you are considered married at this point.

If in doubt, contact an appropriate immigration attorney and/or the local embassy.

You should take a look at the Imbra statutes affecting this. My recollection is that you need a waiver if you submit a new petition less than 2 years ago. You will need to list any prior petitions. It's in the system, expect them to find it. If you did this at the same embassy, and if it was ever sent to the embassy, they will know.

My questions concerns a petition I filed last year. June of last year I filed a for a fiancee visa for another girl. Unfortunately, the relationship did not work out. (The father of her child refused to allow her to immigrate and some other issues!) So, I cancelled the process. I am presently filing another petition for my current fiancee.....will the past petition hurt my present filing?

On forum I-134

(9) I have previously submitted affidavits of support for the following persons. Will I need to list the first petition I filed even though I cancelled it shortly afterward?

(10) I have submitted a visa petition(s) to US Citizenship and Immigration Services on behalf of the following persons:

Will I need to list the first petition I filed.....................and the present petition I am filing?

Hi,

In my experience, it is best to go solo and avoid a lawyer unless you have a complicated case. If you file now, depending on the visa center that you use, you could possibly make it for July. It took us 5.5 months from filing to getting into the country, but we didn't make any mistakes along the way. A lawyer might help you to put the papers together, but they can't speed up anything. You will use some of your time just waiting for him to return the papers. I live on the east coast and the Vermont Center at the time was much speedier. Also, the times listed on the government site are generally on the conservative side. In other words, they say they are working on September 08 cases when they are really looking at December 08 cases. Check the Processing Times and Immigration Timelines to get a good idea. In part it depends on the Embassy you use.

There are some other filing alternatives if you get married, but the K3 option is often slower. Occasionally there is Direct Consular filing (which the London Embassy might still allow). If you live in the country that you want to file you can file there. Give the Embassy a call and find out. It could be significantly quicker.

Cheers

Hello all...I am new to this board but have tried to search for my answers before posting. I am a US Citizen currently working in London. I am set to return to the US in July and would like to bring my fiancée back with me. We are debating a 129F filing of DCF filing after getting married here. She feels that the 129F would be better as we would have time to plan properly. My question is what is the chance of getting the process wrapped up by July. If it is not possible can she still travel on a visa waiver after we apply. Secondly can a lawyer help at all. We have spoken to one here and he qoted £1000 fee for paperwork.

Thank you very much for your help and support and I hope we can make our move back to US successfully!

Hi Shane,

The pictures are secondary evidence. We brought maybe 20 or so, but they NEVER LOOKED AT THEM. They didn't look at much of our evidence at all. I believe that there are a lot of things that come into play when you are being interviewed, but the biggest variable is your interviewer. In the embassy that I was interviewed in, I believe that because it is a big open area they watched the couples and looked to see who had chemistry, etc. I really don't know. For the pictures that you have together, as long as they show some variety, don't look "photoshopped" you should be fine. You only have what you have, and you can take more before you go to the interview.

You are only required to meet once in the last two years.

I agree with the comments below, with a caveat. If you are single, and especially if you are a young single woman, in most countries there are automatic barriers. Most embassy have canned questions for tourist visas including such things as assets and acquaintances in the US. e.g. "Do you have a boyfriend in the US?" "Do you know people in the US? If so, whom?" If the answer is "No", and if you are then denied a tourist visa to the US, then you apply for a K1 shortly thereafter, you may be perceived as having misrepresented yourself at the embassy. My cousin works for a Senator's office and she works on several visa comittees. She warned me that applying for a tourist visa under false premises, being denied, and then being interviewed shortly thereafter (6 months later) for a fiancee visa could and has resulted in denial of K1. It is all up to the interviewer to decide. If they ever feel that you are being untruthful, most embassy employees have a zero tolerance for being untruthful.

Yes, it is okay to go for a tourist visa, but you should tell the truth about relationships. The imperative of issuing a tourist visa is that the embassy needs to believe that you are going to return to your home country. That is why they ask about your assets in your own country, and your relationships with people outside of the country. As soon as you say you have a boyfriend in the US, that could be grounds to deny your tourist visa. If you say you have no boyfriend and then 1 month later you are applying for a K1, that makes it look like you don't have a legitimate relationship. If you get a tourist visa and come a couple of times, you can keep a tourist visa and apply separately for the K1 and legally emmigrate to the US.

I think that in the original question, the person asking the question already qualified their response as not wanting to go the tourist visa route. I would just feel badly if we convinced people that using the tourist visa as a speedy way to avoid the K1 processing time. Do people do it? Sure. No question. It just comes with risks. When you apply to the embassy for the K1, they ask if you have any visas for any other countries, if you have ever applied for a US visa, if you have been denied a US or other national visa, etc.

The embassy's keep records of each interview. They cross-reference. Is the K1 visa worth it? Yes. It is the legal way to enter the US to be with the one you love. You have 90 days to marry, so you can spend those 3 months deciding if you are the same being together as being apart. If it doesn't work out, you can go home, and it will show that you are willing to abide by immigration laws. I know a lady who came in on a k1, went back home without marrying, then came back 2 years later on a new K1 for different fiancee. As always, your mileage may vary, but always tell the truth.

K1's and new tourist visas should not be mixed together. If you apply for a tourist visa and then a K1 it raises red flags. If you apply for a tourist visa and are not accepted it makes the k1 look suspicious. Lots of risks involved.

or have your partner join you through a visitors/tourist visa and marry her then change status.

Probably not best to be advising someone to do this. If you mean for them to come here on a visitor's visa with the intent of marrying and adjusting status, then what you are advising is visa fraud. I would tread lightly with such advice.

To the OP: Of course it's worth it if your fiancee is worth it. It's time consuming, frustrating, and can be costly. But is it worth it? Heck yeah.

i did not mean it the illegal way.

i meant if the fiance already had the visitor's visa, why not marry there? since the OP's problem here was how much they were gonna spend and if it was worth the expense.

well my bad.

i meant IF the partner already had a tourist/visitors visa.

i had a tourist visa and still came flew back to the PI then apply for K1. if i only knew it was that costly and with USCIS delaying things, i should have just stayed and got married. but still regardless... weighing it down... i was glad we went through the K1 cos it got me thinking if i really wanted to be with my bf and vice versa.

USCIS really shook the insanity in both of us. and made us realize how we really felt for each other.

it turned out to be a blessing in disguise.

you truly find out how important you are to the other person. everything was worth it.

K1's and new tourist visas should not be mixed together. If you apply for a tourist visa and then a K1 it raises red flags. If you apply for a tourist visa and are not accepted it makes the k1 look suspicious. Lots of risks involved.

or have your partner join you through a visitors/tourist visa and marry her then change status.

Probably not best to be advising someone to do this. If you mean for them to come here on a visitor's visa with the intent of marrying and adjusting status, then what you are advising is visa fraud. I would tread lightly with such advice.

To the OP: Of course it's worth it if your fiancee is worth it. It's time consuming, frustrating, and can be costly. But is it worth it? Heck yeah.

i did not mean it the illegal way.

i meant if the fiance already had the visitor's visa, why not marry there? since the OP's problem here was how much they were gonna spend and if it was worth the expense.

well my bad.

i meant IF the partner already had a tourist/visitors visa.

i had a tourist visa and still came flew back to the PI then apply for K1. if i only knew it was that costly and with USCIS delaying things, i should have just stayed and got married. but still regardless... weighing it down... i was glad we went through the K1 cos it got me thinking if i really wanted to be with my bf and vice versa.

USCIS really shook the insanity in both of us. and made us realize how we really felt for each other.

it turned out to be a blessing in disguise.

you truly find out how important you are to the other person. everything was worth it.

Hello!

I have been to Caracas before. It was an interesting city, but I went before Chavez came into power. From what I understand, Venezuela is a difficult place to live, but I wouldn't know. Would your fiancee want to live in Venezuela? If so, there is no reason to get a fiancee visa. If you have a sincere love for each other and want to live in the US, yes! Do the fiancee visa. It's hard to leave your own country, so you need to really love your fiancee a lot. Can you leave your country and be away for at least 6 months? Is this the person you want to spend the rest of your life with?

Those are the kinds of questions you want to ask yourself. If you just want to go to the US for a visit, it would be the wrong type of visa.

Hello

I'm from Venezuela and my fiance and I are planning on applying for fiance visa in a couple of weeks. So far I have heard of two friends of mine who have tried to get the fiance visa. They all said it was just a waste of money, that they waited and waited and they never got an answer and they also spent so much money on it. So My Question is: Is it really worth it to apply for a fiance visa? It would be great if anyone from Venezuela who is going/went through the process let me know their point of view of Fiance visa. Thank you so much!

I think that this might be a bit hard for some to follow. I am not sure that I got it right. The timeline is a bit of a challange. Due to you ex wife coming into the country in 2008, having a child with another woman in 2005, it appears that her immigration to the US is questionable. If the person reviewing your case does some cross referencing, and sees that you divorced shortly after she got her SSN, they might think that there was something fraudulent happening. The thing that would ####### up my ears is that you had a child with the second woman during your ex-wife's pre-immigration. You also tipically have a financial obligation to your ex-wife, even outside of the terms of your divorce, to support her economically. Your income, if a bit on the lower side, might not be considered to be enough to support both your ex and your wife in the event that they both need your support. This might be one for a lawyer to look at.

hello everyone,

just need advice on this. i recently filed for a k1 petition for my new girl in the philippines and got the NOA1 last oct 29, 2008. there are some questions i want to know if there would be some problems when it comes to my fiance's approval to get the k1 visa. I am a US citizen and was married to a filipina last 2000.i filed for her IR1 visa on 2004 and she got her visa and left for the US last april 2008. i met another filipina last 2005 and got a baby with her (who is now a US citizen btw). it was all because i fell in love with the new filipina but still continued for my first wive's IR1 petition. my first wife has forgiven me after everythin that happend and things are going well among the 3 of us. we hav agreed to get divorced the moment she gets her SSN. now that she has her SSN and now working, i went to guam last may 2008 and filed for a divorce after a month of staying in guam. i got the court order that we are finally divorced last august 2008 and immediately filed for the k1 visa for my new girl. we got the NOA1 last oct 29,2008 and went back to the philippines to stay with her for a while again. got in the philippines last nov 4, 2008 up to the present. my question is, would there be some complications as far as being with my new girl in the middle of my first wive's petition? i got divorced before filing the K1 visa petition but our relationship is active since 2005 before my first wife got her IR1 visa.

My second question is, about her point of entry. i filed in the guam sent it to CSC but i was wondering if can her point of entry be in new york or in hawaii, not guam?

I hope i can get answers from you guys. i know our relationship is really interesting and kinda messed up but were going thru it.

thank you guys!

Soon we are flying from Bogota to Miami. I read that some people go to the interview process together which suggests to me that I can go through the same immigration line as my fiancee, traveling on our freshly issued K1.

Which lines do we get into? There are lines for permanent residents/citizens and for visitors. How do we go through together? How can I join her for her interview?

Thanks!

Arty

A quick note on using congressional or senatorial involvement in your case....

Everything has to be "by the book" (which your case seems to be). You generally cannot use a senator or congressman to help you if you haven't followed procedure. Like I said, in this case you have and their involvement is the wise thing to do. It is better than having a lawyer. My cousin works as a liason in this capacity at a congressional office, and I have seen her do things that lawyers could not, simply because she gets involved in more of the tricky stuff.

Your baby of course has to have a US passport. Get a notorized copy of your baby's birth certificate. That has both names on it, right. and write a letter stating that you give permission for your wife to take your daughter out of the country without you. Some countries require this, some don't, but it is a good idea. Ypu can also get a notarized copy of your marriage certificate. Nothing wrong with over-preparing.

Hi,

I just called NVC to check what was happening with my petition and, the automatic system says: the number is incorrect or we didn't receive your papers. I dont know what to think...we got I-797 2 weeks ago that the case was forwarded to NVC...

What do you think?

It should be there now and you could also call the receiving embassy to see if they have received the papers (assuming that it is allowed at the embassy).

When you get a new passport, and you should do it before 6 months is all that is left, you should be sending in the old passport and then will receive a cancelation stamp on the passport. Keep it. Never mail a passport out of the country without a compelling need. You can certainly bring it to the interview, but only as backup. In any case, you can't travel (most of the time) on a passport with less than 6 months on it. You risk not being allowed to board the plane, and also risk being turned back at immigration at the destination country.

How do I find out that NVC got my approval of K1?

K1 visas are almost a rubber stamps. They spend very little time in the center. It's down the street from where I work and I kept thinking about my paperwork whenever I drove by. The time that it took for it to go from VSC to the embasassy, passing through the NVC was about 2 weeks.

Hi all

Our case has not been updated at all since they received it. NOA1 arrived but I don't see our case has been updated at all for 2 months. It looks like that everyone`s case has been touched time to time, but it is nothing unusual not to be touched at all as well, right?

I suppose this is what you mean by long wait?

You might never receive a touch before you get your NOA2. The process keeps going forward, you don't lose you place in the queue. For us it was 5 months from submitting paperwork until we had our interview and got approved. At two months, I can understand how much you want to see progress. The experience of many is that they never see an update until they receive their paperwork.

Hang in there!

2. For the step 2 medical examination is that when I need to have all my immunizations up to date? Will there be another physical in the future?

Count on only having one appointment. You will likely have your appointment days before the interview. You should bring records of all of your vaccinations, but they will apply and charge you for missing vaccinations. A couple of the vaccinations might be a series, and they might let you go with part of the vaccination done. Some embassy approved doctors might make out very well from the vaccinations as they can be expensive.

3. Do I get all my immunizations administered by my family doctor or by the appointed physician?

That which you don't have, you will have administered.

4. It says on the site I need to get the 3 HPV shots. It also says the second shot is administered 2 months after the first, and the third six months after the second. Do I need to have all 3 HPV shots before I do the medical exam listed in step 2?

Not necessarilly, but you can call the doctor on the embassy list and ask. This varies country to country.

Of course, we are on cloud 9 and later we will be posting our review of the embassy, but for right now we just wanted to say that we were approved! We are very happy and we were treated very respectfully. The interview was very short, and my Lili convinced me that getting there early was important to getting out of there quickly (It's darn cold). She was right. They process the paperwork serially and those who got in early were seen early. It all depends on your papers being approved "behind the curtains" quickly by having one's papers in order. Missing documents means a re-appointment. Depending on the papers needed, this could be days or longer.

The embassy staff was very helpful, and my fiancee was impressed by the order that was kept at the embassy. The waiting area is somewhat open air, and the cold can wear on you if you're not used to it. We are very grateful to the helpful information that people at visajourney have provided. It's a great place to take the mystery out of the process.

We were able to do everything without a lawyer, but I should add that there were no complications. YMMV.

We only needed the i-134 for the financial affadavit. They returned the I-864 to us.

I know that no system is perfect and that a lot of people have disappointing experiences with embassies and the entire process. Bogota, from my very minute exposure, is pretty well run and the staff is very professional. Are some of the people very matter-of-fact? Sure. But they spend the day making sure everything is in order and they rewarded honest and correct paperwork with a visa approval. That's all I wanted. Our interviewer smiled and was very nice. That might be the luck of the draw, but we would have been okay if they weren't as nice.

If you have your paperwork in order, act respectful, and have a bonafide relationship that exhibits more than a casual interest, you should be fine. I met one couple who had only met once, married, and hadn't seen each other in more than a year. That is a pretty tough case. You have to fight your way through a case like that and my heart goes out to people who form a long distance relationship and have a hard time being together during the long wait.

If I had to sum up my experience, I would say to pay plenty of attention to the paperwork and to take plenty of pictures and to document your relationship. We are an obvious couple when people see us. The people who interview you need to be convinced that you are for real. I think that the piece of evidence that did us the most justice was the engagement listing from my local newspaper.

I know that the process isn't over, but I am grateful to the help and support that many have given me during this journey.

Blessings!

Arty and Lili

Do you have a frequent flyer account with the airline(s) that you used? You can also use that account to show the flight information. As mentioned, passport stamps are very authorative (if legible) and other receipts including credit card receipts/statements help!

To be clear...if you have a visa already, GREAT! ....but... it isn't intended for marriage and don't use it as such. Go for the K1 fiancee visa and use the tourist visa to keep from remaining apart through the whole process. I fell in love with a Colombian woman and she didn't have a tourist visa. I knew that I wanted to marry her, so we applied for the K-1. Could she have received a tourist visa??? Maybe. She worked for the government at a military clinic as a nurse. I visited her 8 times since February, and I have a full time, very serious job. I would guess that I spent $15,000.00 visiting her this year. Had she had a tourist visa, she could have come here and it would have cost less. Had she applied for a tourist visa, getting the K1 would have been HARDER given the proximity of applications for a tourist and k-1 visa.

Your case is different. Your fiancee aleady has a visa or two in place. If your fiancee is in the country already for a different purpose, it is permissible to marry. If she is out of the country, the K1 is the correct way to go. Marriage is for a long time. Having your spouse enter the country on the wrong visa type could cost you a lot of money and you might have to move to her country for 10 years due to her being banned for visa fraud. At least you don't have to wait without seeing her for a long time. Many people on these boards are lucky to see their fiancee twice in the same year.

Good luck. Always do the right thing..That's what we did and our interview is 5 months, 1 week after submitting our papers . Does it always happen so quickly? No, but doing the right thing is a great way to start a marriage.

Hi!

When I filled out my petition, I included the "lovey-dovey" stuff. What matters most is the quality of your evidence. By the time that I had submitted my paperwork, I had 3 trips to visit her completed. I had tickets, receipts and photos. the important thing is that you keep to describing and proving that you have a relationship. It isn't required that you have the romance of the century.

Avoid anything that is unnecessary and might make them ask questions, but be honest. For example, you wouldn't want to say, "every time we have a lover's spat she comes running back", or "she lives somewhere in the mountains of Thailand". I know that this is an absurd thing to put in the document, but you get my drift.

Send copies of receipts for an engagement ring, phone statements, tickets, pictures etc.