lee b

Don't feel too bad. My wife and daughter had POE on January 28 and we have been optimized since March 4 and nothing has happened or updated since then. I just sent an email to Texas so hopefully in two weeks we will get some sort of answer.

Good luck to everyone else who is waiting.

It took us a week after it was completed at NVC to get the interview date. However, the inter view was scheduled for two months later. For us we were finished with NVC on November 18, 2013 and we got a letter from them the day after Thanksgiving and it said our interview was scheduled for January 16, 2014.

Don't use my timeline as a guide. Our case was approved by USCIS then recalled back to there. The interview was relatively painless and aside from an error on the DS-260 it was over in less than 10 minutes.

Good luck to you.

I am certainly glad that we waited. Somehow they managed to send out my wifes visa but not our daughters. So now we have to see if they will do it tomorrow. Holidays are so inconvenient at a time like this.

Oksana and Alisa had her interview yesterday and they told her she was approved. I just checked the CEAC website and says their visas were issued. Does anybody know how long it will take before she can pick them up? We want to buy plane tickets for next week, but should we wait for them to pick them up first? Any opinions or experiences would be appreciated.

We had our DS-230 at NVC and then on Friday we got the checklist the we had to now do a DS-260. Kinda sucks but what can you do? Does anyone know how long it takes to review the new form?

I was in a similar situation with my wife and stepdaughter and I filed separate I-864EZ's. I have to redo them and will once again file the separate EZ forms.

Thanks for the replies. Just got the email from NVC. I don't have to pay the fees again, but I do have to resubmit the affidavit of support. I just have to wait for last years tax transcripts and we are on our way.

My timeline is confusing because of the way it happened. I'll summarize:

We applied for the I-130 on August 25, 2012.

It was approved on November 23, 2012.

AOS completed December 7, 2012

IV fees paid December 19, 2012

DS 3032 returned to NVC on January 18, 2013

Then USCIS recalled our application and sent us a NOID. I am not sure when the recall happened but the NOID was sent on February 5, 2013.

NOID reply received by USCIS on March 1, 2013

I-130 reaffirmed on July, 20 2013

Received at NVC on July 25, 2013

Stuck at NVC in AP since then

I was not exactly sure how to enter a date for a NOID and also for a reaffirmation, so I just entered them as new approved dates. NVC has already told me that I won't have to pay the fees again therefore those dates would remain the same. Sorry for the confusion with my timeline.

So basically our application was approved by USCIS in November of 2012 and all fees were paid to NVC by December 19, 2012. All forms were sent to NVC and then on February 5, 2013 we received a NOID. We sent over all of the information to straighten out the issue. We were finally reaffirmed and our case is back at NVC and of course we are back in AP. Since all of the fees were paid and it has only been six months does that mean I will have to repay the fees? When I called NVC they said that I do not, but I don't have a lot of confidence in the employees there. If anyone has had any experience like this please give me some kind of idea of how it plays out from here. I would greatly appreciate it.

Do the same three situations apply for an I-130 application? We just got out of USCIS and went into AP at NVC.

Just got the letter from NVC it states:

NVC returned the petition to the Department of Homeland Security's U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). Please direct any further inquiries to USCIS.

It doesn't give any reason why it was sent. Is this normal or should I be freaking out more than I already am?

That is a little more disheartening. The reason we filed the i=130 is because my wife had to leave the country to go handle some family matters and her travel documents weren't renewed yet. (The first one had expired after one year.) Therefore our i-485 was considered abandoned. We have waited a long time with USCIS and I had to go to Russia to celebrate our two year anniversary last month. Crazy! I really do hope that it is just some simple clerical issue.

Thanks. I hope that you are right. I am a bundle of nerves right now. I still have to tell my wife later. Stupid time difference.

I just found out that USCIS requested our file back from NVC on Friday. They are unable to give me a reason why, because the file hasn't made it back yet. Has this happened to anyone else before and should I be worried? Any advice or comments would be appreciated.

Thanks.

I was not aware that NVC would send us these forms through email. It's awesome as I am sure it saved me a few days. Which every little bit helps at this point. Of course since the AOS bill was included I shouldn't be too surprised that the government suddenly became efficient!

I wanted to wish you all good luck on the wait. I am sure that your day is coming soon.

We just got our NVC case number assigned and I really believe that the pace is picking up in both places and the transfers are helping to speed things up.

Just got off the phone and we got our NVC numbers. As soon as the wife calls me back she can send in the choice of agent email. I have all of the AOS tax documents ready to go. The only thing we are waiting for is the police certificate. We have everything else ready to go.

It is so exciting and everything is finally starting to feel like it is speeding up. The funny thing is I was convinced it was not going to be this fast and I am flying to Russia for Christmas and New Years. Now we joke that the girls could be coming back with me. I know it won't be that fast, but roughly from this point does anyone know if February is realistic?

The approval notice says it came from NBC in Missouri, but I thought it was transferred to Orlando. My assumption is that it was approved in Orlando, but forwarded through NBC. That is of course only my guess as the notice does say the National Benefits Service.

Thanks everyone. I am in Orlando, Florida. I hope everyone who is waiting gets theres quickly too. I think the transfers really are helping out so much. I already had plans to visit my wife for Christmas and now we are hoping that she can come back with me. We realize that it is pretty unlikely given the short time frame, but it is great to have dreams!

I was looking over James' shortcuts and I never saw anything in regards to a minor child. My wife and stepdaughter just got their approvals and we are trying to stay a step ahead of the NVC process. We wanted to send the choice of agent email to NVC and the template only specifies for the spouse. I am thinking it should still come from my wifes email address and just change spouse to stepfather etc. Does anyone else have any experience or ideas?

Just got our approval email notice. Had to check the USCIS website to make sure it was real. It only took 76 days and while that personally felt like forever it is a small drop in the bucket to what some others here have been waiting for. I truly hope for those who have been waiting an extended amount of time that your day is around the corner.

I just got the email from USCIS and we are approved. It took 76 days. When I get the hard copy I will let everyone know where the approval came from. I suspect it will be the Orlando office, but we'll see. Good luck to everyone who is still waiting.

Thanks, I was thinking the same thing, but I actually work 5 minutes from the USCIS office. Do you think I could just show up before the appointment and get it straightened out? I want to be proactive and get in front of this as quickly as I can. Both of the I-130's should be sitting in the same office since they were transferred to a local office back in September by the National Benefits Center.

So my wife and stepdaughter had a pending 1-485 application and they had to go back to Russia before their travel documents could be renewed. After they left I got a notice in the mail saying that my wife's application was abandoned. This is fine as we have already applied for an I-130 and now that is pending. However, today I got a text message updating my stepdaughters case. The USCIS website states that a letter went out with an appointment letter for my stepdaughters interview. I assumed that that her application was abandoned as was my wifes. We have already applied for both of them to get a CR-1. Should I go to the the office when I get the actual letter in hand and explain the situation? I don't want this to interfere with our pending I-130's. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

I am not sure if this matters, but in December will be our 2 year anniversary. My stepdaughter is 5 years old. I doubt this is relevant, but I figured the more information the better.

Thanks for any advice.

We filed on August 27th in California and were transferred to NBC on the 29th. We were then transferred again on September 12th. I spoke with USCIS this morning and was told that we were transferred back to California. Other than that the agent I spoke to on the phone had no other information other than the transfers were done to speed the process up. Which makes no sense to me since it was sent right back to where it was. My own personal theory is that so many applications were sent from VSC ans CSC that they become bogged down and had to send some back to where they came from. That is just my opinion and should certainly not be regarded as anything more than that. Trust me I am fairly dumb about these things.