Matt_UK

You'll be alright. Stop panicking

Reassuring

plus the original submittion to make it complete because the adjudication officer may not necessarily have "complete" document at time.

Is the standard practice of RFE'ers to send the requested information AND copies of the previously submitted information? I need to submit more evidence of things that I partially covered, and completely new evidence, so should I just build a new package and send it with everything?

Hi all. Work and stresses meant I drifted away from this site. I filed my I-751 in late July and following the Biometric session in October I now have a I-797e (dated March 11th but received around the 25th).

The further evidence we were asked to provide is about commingling of assets, which we really haven't done much. We have a semi shared bank account system, where my wife can dip into my checking account if needed but since we both earn a reasonable amount we don't need to much. We both wanted to be accountable for our own spending to a degree, and this is probably going to come back and haunt us.

I don't drive so the car is hers, we rent so no house, purchases were made by one of us either for the other or not (hard to prove). Arrrggh the obvious thing is to travel back in time and just dump all the cash together...

Plan is to get a letter from the credit union to explain how the account works, and to provide a cover letter detailing why we made that choice. Does this sound sensible? It seems odd that mixing cash should be a requirement for a visa, but then it wouldn't be as odd as the essential TB check for people moving from the UK.

So here's the question: How interested do you imagine they will be in my tax forms? I filed my taxes late due to the fact I didn't realize I had to file while living abroad and working for a foreign company. In a couple weeks I'm sending out for my transcripts, since my taxes should be processed by then. But I imagine I'd be small potatoes to them since my income will immediately end as soon as I leave the UK.

I had a similar situation, they gave most scrutiny to the co sponsors details, but they did still need all the forms my wife had filed through her time in the UK. If not for the tax/income issue then it shows that you maintained links to the US while you were out of the country.

Side note... wow they've made this a long process. 13 month application period?

Not sure on point 2, since she will be a household member when you need the support but isn't at the moment. It sounds like you have it right but I'm not in a position to definitively say.

For question 1;

My wife the USC was back in the states by the time I had the interview so she used the American address. This certainly helped with domicile ^^.

All you need to prove though is that you have made steps to re-establish domicile, so you can live in the UK without issue. You will need to produce some evidence that you are going to be domicile in the states. Common items are;

- Rental agreements

- Mover quotes

- Keeping ties (bank account/driving license/taxes)

- Job offers

That kind of thing anyway.

Indeed, it is the point the application is filed that they need to be in the country. However if you have any complications it may be better for them to be around/capable of being around to resolve them.

My wife moved back to the states between I-130 approval and the CR1 application.

I didn't think I was on the list, then I realised I was Mike

Thanks and good luck ^^

Definately wish my wife had been able to be there, though maybe it made the domicile issue easier for us.

Interview completed without incident, Visa being sent next week. Very happy.

Now to get homeless and jobless.

I posted in the UK interview thread but the main thing I can advise is get there early. The letter says 30mins before but I'd suggest just going as soon as and take an umbrella for your documents.

Domicile was very easily overcome as my Wife has moved back to the states already, however they didn't seem that interested in the evidence I had about it.

Had the interview on Thursday morning.

I can't over emphasise how useful it is to get there early. My interview was slated for 9am but I joined the queue at 7:30am and was able to get in fairly quickly. Even then I was still 6th of the Immigrant visa numbers.

They had 25 windows serving Visa's but only 1 was doing I numbers until about 9am, then another started. Expect to get 30 or so N numbers called in the time it takes an I number to get done.

My case was fairly straightforward I had all original documents and copies with me, and 2 extra folders of things I didn't end up needing. I was using a joint sponsor and no input to the requirement from myself or my wife. The joint sponsor has almost double the guidelines and is a full citizen so no issues there.

The first woman I spoke to took various documents and asked me to pay the fee. When I came back she filled out a checklist. She made a couple of notes in red which were points for the consular officer to discuss or check, domicile and a previous refusal at the NVC (I-129F a few years back).

"Interview" turned out to be the wrong label for it. The consular officer asked me to swear what I had submitted was correct to the best of my knowledge, said he didn't know why domicile would be an issue (My wife moved back to the states a month or so back, and had a letter from HR at her place of work), said the previous refusal didn't matter. He approved me without asking any questions.

I was out of the embassy at around 10:30, very stressful build up but suprisingly smooth in the end.

Congratulations Stacey.

I've been a bit delayed waiting for my joint sponser to get the information to me. Hopefully that is all sorted now and it should be picking up again. I'm a bit worried that I wont' have the correct tax information for the interview though, is there a good resource which can show me what is required? I have no experience with US tax documents.

Over cautious questions !

1) Do I need to write my case number LDN<number> on the DS230-I or will they just match it up by name?

2) Do I need to send parts of the DS230 at the same time? or do I not send the 2nd part at all?

3) How risky is sending the checklist back without having a few of the key documents ready at the moment. (Joint sponsors I864 etc).

If I wasn't desperately avoiding upsetting them I would send some feedback on it. They could easily set up clearer instructions that are repeated either less or in the same format each time.

Just thought I'd post here about a confusion I've overcome...

I was fairly sure that I was expected to fill in both parts of the DS230 and send it back to the VISA branch, then at a later date submit the ds2001 and await an interview. The instructions sent to me however suggest that I fill everything in, collect all the documents and only send the DS2001 back.

The letter links us to the usembassy website /cons_new/visa/iv/ds2001.html. Which states;

Step One

Complete the Form DS-230-Part 1 for each family member applying for a visa. The formcontains questions regarding specific biographical information required for the immigrant visa.

Step Two

Assemble all of the documents required in support of your application. When you have obtained all of the required documents and are prepared for the visa interview, you are required to complete Form DS-2001 and document checklist.[/Quote]

The clearer instructions though appear to be on /cons_new/visa/iv/ivprocess.html which state;

"What do I do first?

The biographic data form DS-23O-I should be completed for each person applying for a visa, regardless of age. The form may be photocopied if insufficient copies are received for each family member. The DS-230-I should be completed and returned immediately to the Immigrant Visa Unit at the Embassy in order for them to begin the administrative processing of the application."[/Quote]

Received approval notice today, filed 24th Feb with one request for further evidence and now approved on 26 April.

Very happy, collecting stuff begins again!

What comes next should be the packet of information for you to collect and send back to them, along with arranging dates for medicals and finally interviews.

I would suggest looking at some of the timelines in this thread;

http://www.visajourney.com/forums/topic/240695-uk-dcf-the-ins-and-outs-and-ups-and-downs/

Most if not all are going through UK DCF and will give an indication of delays on packets being sent etc. If it has been lost or forgotten then I'm sure someone there will know what to do.

Sadly I don't :/

Excellent news ^^

Interesting about the tax documents, other interview threads seemed to suggest that less is often more. Maybe a personal preference of the interviewer?

Congratulations Taavy ^^

It does seem to be very dependant on how well the I-130 progresses. A RFE seems to take about a week minimum to gather all the information and seems to add about 3 weeks on average.

I do think they've caught up somewhat after an early 2010 rush, as they are now processing applications around 5 weeks after receipt.

http://www.usembassy.org.uk/dhs/uscis/i130filing.html

I'm sending mine back this week so hopefully things will seem to speed up, or at least feel like they're progressing again.

Thanks ^^

Yea I keep forgetting they are real people at times. We've kept seperate names because of her Passport but her name is still on council tax and bills. As for bank accounts we didn't see much need given that we'd be moving back to the states so it will probably help us with the domicile thing in the future anyway.

Good news, thanks for the help.

I think the 129-F is probably a matter for a new topic as it isn't likely to apply to most people. Would have thought the comingling thing comes up more often though.

Relaxing a bit now

Received a letter from USCIS London today, got all excited but it was I-130 RFE :-(

They want Affidavits for how we met and came to be married, and 3 from third parties knowing the bona fides of our relationship. They also want evidence of comingling of assets and an explanation of how our I-129F (filed in Chicago before the US > UK visa process) was rejected.

I'd really appreciate the following help;

1) Does anyone have a good example of the format of the affidavits?

2) We only have our joint names on some utility bills, no joint bank accounts or rental agreements, is that likely to be enough? Should we add an explanation of why we haven't used a joint accounts etc?

3) The I-129F had a request for further information which our solicitor didn't provide in time, we could have appealed but got bored of the long wait times and legal fee's associated with the US process and just applied for my wife to come to the UK. Is that a good reason or?

Thanks Matt! The email I sent asking to reprocess our payment actually went through and I got a response! So hopefully they give it another shot soon. I'm hoping we hear back with a NOA1 this week. It's only been a week since we filed our application but I'm getting antsy already.

Has anyone else filed their I-130 recently and heard back anything?

Email confirmation was sent to us on 1 March confirming they received it February 24th. THey took the payment on Friday though.

On a seperate note is there a general issue with police certificates being delayed (I haven't applied yet) or is it normally a long wait? Should I apply now, I guess they don't need specifics from the next part of the process?

Makes perfect sense thanks. I'll hold off until after the process is complete to let the USCIS know that they should call it something more appropriate.

They haven't been released yet, but should be any day now (or so the buzz on VJ goes).

Ah thanks.

I'm looking at getting things ready for the next set of forms, we have a co sponsor who is living in the US. We won't be living with the co sponsor and I'm not sure what that does to our household size. The situation is, there are two of us, we will be initially living with a friend of my wife who isn't co sponsoring us and we have a co sponsor that lives elsewhere.

Is our household size, 2 me and wife, 3 me wife and co sponsor, 3 me wife and flat mate or 4 all of the above.