mizhael smith

That is my best advice too.

Maybe the original poster can spend more time in the Philippines in order to attend his fiancée's interview, and to either pick up her visa or wait for it at her home.

The return flight might be more expensive since they would be buying the tickets on short notice...but it would be worth it if they could fly to the States together.

hello everyone who might be reading this.

i went ahead and ordered two plane tickets one month ago one was a round trip for me, and one was a one way for my wife on the same flight as my return flight. this return flight was one week after the interview date. after the consular told us the visa was approved i asked him if we could pick it up there and he told me that they prefer only to do that in a medical or family emergency situation. we then decided to go with having it delivered via air21 which only took two days to deliver it to us in metro manila.

however our friends who had their interview the same day were able to pick theres up. i believe the excuse they gave was that they were staying in the hotel across the street.

so i believe it is the consulars discretion as suggested, so my advice for anyone wanting to follow the same route would be to get a hotel in manila if your beneficiary does not live there and just have air21 deliver it to the hotel as it only takes 2 business days.

good luck.

Congratulations

thank you for your help.

hello everyone:

we are about to have our interview soon and my wife was wondering about the requirements for the NBI. she read somewhere that the embassy will be looking for a copy of the NBI in her maiden name as well as her married name.

the NBI she has on file with the NVC looks like this, FAMILY, MAIDEN, MIDDLE, FIRST ... so it has both her maiden name and her married name on it.

is this what everyone's NBI looks like when they were approved? or will she need to go back and get an NBI clearance that is just her maiden name?

please let us know.

thank you.

hi can you tell what was the outcome of calling them? Was it somethign they did not receive or they recieved it but did not log in their system and just mailed you the checklist?

Please reply,

thanks,

yes. they received it on a Friday, and it was not officially in their system until the following Wednesday.

be patient .. and good luck

for people following this thread:

thanks for your advice,

the route we are taking is i am going to fly to manila with a return ticket and with a one way booked for my wife about a week after her interview. we are going to ask the interviewer if we can pick up the visa there at the embassy, and keep our fingers crossed that they allow us to. if they say no we will wait for it to be delivered. and pray it all happens in one week. if it is delayed then we will reschedule both flights for the fee which should not be too much maybe $100.

three one way tickets will cost more then 1 one way and 1 round trip delayed, as far as i can tell.

i will report back to this thread the results so that people will know what happened.

thanks.

thank you everyone for all of your help.

mike and zharina

Yes, depending on where she lives. But I have seen visa delivery's for individuals who live in Manila that has taken longer then 1 week, my wife lived two hour out side Manila and her's took 3 days. Go and have her take the medical ASAP get that out of the way, this will help streamline the process.

is the manila embassy still allowing people to come in and pick up the visa when it is ready?

has anyone recently bought there plane ticket one week after the scheduled interview date?

my wife really wants me to accompany her to her interview, but i have a limited time off work. it looks like some people in the past used the plane tickets as reason to be able to pick up the visa at the embassy.

has this worked for anyone recently?

please let us know.

mike.

I will be attending Joy's interview, so I bought a round trip ticket for me. About 2 weeks ago, I purchased a one-way ticket for Joy on the same flight as my return so we can travel back to the US together a week after the interview.

Yes, I am gambling that the embassy will approve the visa and allow us to pick it up in time for Joy to make the scheduled flight. It is, however, a calculated risk. If I wait until we have Joy's visa in hand, I may not be able to get her on the same flight as me, or the price may be prohibitive. So, we are rolling the dice. <img src="http://www.visajourney.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/wink.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="" border="0" alt="wink.gif" />

Marc

hello marc:

we are planning to do exactly what you did in how you booked your flights together, what i noticed is that you picked up the visa at the embassy, however i have heard from others you cant do this. how did you make it happen?

i want to fly in the day before my wifes interview then fly out with her a week later, and gamble on her passing the interview but we are confident.

please let me know.

mike

Your Idea is nice but wishful thinking. Have your wife take the medical now, you can not schedule back to back. After your medical St. Luke’s will forward the result the USEM then the interview will be scheduled, as for the time it takes St. Luke’s to submit is a few days. You can not pick up the visa it will be sent to the address on the form your wife fills out, the visa can take from 2 days to 2 weeks delivered via Air 21 so don’t plan on booking anything at this point.

is it 2 days to 2 weeks depending on where she lives?

because the original plan was for me to arrive the day before her interview then hope the visa will be in her hand within 5 days, she just lives in pasig. do you think its possible?

hello:

we are about to complete our case at the NVC and soon we will be scheduling the medical appointment, and interview.

we plan to schedule them back to back ... like the medical Monday and Tuesday, then the interview Wednesday. the reason for this is that i will be flying to manila to accompany my wife to both but i only have a week to spend there until i have to go back to work.

we figure that we can go back to the embassy and pick up the visa in person after the interview then fly home to the states together.

does anyone have experience keeping a tight schedule like this at the manila embassy?

1) how quickly does st lukes submit the paperwork to the embassy so we can have the interview?

2) if we can get the interview on Wednesday do you think we can pick up the visa on Friday then fly home Sunday?

3) and finally should i book my wifes flight when i book my ticket or is there some reason i cant until she has her visa?

please let us know if you can help.

thank you.

hello:

its may 5th and we just got a checklist saying that the NVC has not yet received our ds-230, however it was delivered to them last friday the 30th.

do we have any reason for concern?

please let us know.

thank you.

hello:

are the invoice ID number for the AOS bill and the IV bill the same number?

i ask because on the NVC's online payment site it now says not paid on the IV bill section when before it said not billed, but we haven't received the invoice from them. can we pay it now?

thank you.

hello everyone:

we applied for an ITIN with our federal taxes this year, i have received the federal return but am still waiting on the state return. when i applied for the federal return i attached the w-7 and passport copy of my wife but on the state return i only wrote in applying for ITIN. i did not submit any paperwork to prove that we were applying for the ITIN as the w-7 is a federal form and California did not ask for it.

am i going to need to file again a revised 540 now that my wife has a ITIN?

or will this happen internally between the feds and the state?

if anyone has experience with this please let me know,

thank you.

hello everyone:

we just received our NOA2 so i started calling the NVC to get our case number and now have that.

i have noticed that on a lot of peoples timelines they received there AOS package and ds-3032 package immediately after the NVC got there petition. however the NVC told me on the phone wait 6 to 8 weeks to hear from them.

which one is it?

can a seasoned VJ member give us some advice?

thank you.

i would like to quote the lingche NVC guide here with a few questions to those of you who have completed the process. hopefully someone can help us

"Try to have all documents below in the hands of the Petitioner"

1) Photocopy Requirement - In addition to sending the original documents or certified copies of the documents to the NVC, the applicant and each accompanying family member must submit a photocopy of the original documents or certified copies of the documents.

2) Police Certificate based on country

3) Each applicant will need to obtain an original birth certificate issued by the official custodian of birth records in the country of birth, showing the date and place of birth and the parentage of the alien, based upon the original registration of birth.

I am the petitioner living here in the united states here are the questions:

1) photocopy requirement

will i need to make a copy of every original i have and submit the copy to the NVC with the original when they ask for it? will they even ask for it?

2) does the police certificate that i (as the petitioner) will submit have to be an original? or will a copy be ok? (my wife only has one official copy currently)

3) same question as number 2. for the birth certificate

please let me know.

thank you.

We are about to file taxes for the first time as joint filer's. my wife is applying for an ITIN because she is still in the Philippines, and from what i understand i will submit the form W-7 requesting an ITIN with my federal 1040 to a special address in Texas.

however i am wondering what to do about state taxes?

do i just write applying for ITIN where my wifes SSN belongs? and submit to the normal address for the state forms?

has anyone done this successfully before?

for you http://manila.usembassy.gov/wwwfiven.pdf

thank you.

One thing to think about, they may only make her visa valid until 6 months after the date of her medical, instead of from her interview date. My wife had to postpone her interview because of having to take a sputum test and her visa expired 6 months from her medical.

thank you

that may have just saved us some trouble

This will tell you the whole trip!

It's for KI but same address for CR-1/IR-1

http://manila.usembassy.gov/wwwfk1en.pdf

wow file (wwwfk1en.pdf) is great, does anyone know the link to the same form but for the CR-1?

Can someone give us the adress of St. Lukes?

my wife wants to do an advanced medical, and there is a St lukes near her place.

but were not sure if they do the required exam there.

thank you

im having trouble with this w-7 form, because the guidelines state that a notarized copy of my wifes passport is only good if the country of residence is party to the hauge convention, which the Philippines is not.

HAS ANYONE HAD EXPERIENCE GETTING AN ITIN APPROVED WHILE STILL LIVING IN THE PHILIPPINES?

HOW DO I GET A CERTIFIED COPY OF MY WIFES PASSPORT THAT WILL BE APPROVED BY THE IRS?

He will file "Married Filing Jointly", but need to also send in IRS form W-7 to get your ITIN. This must be submitted along with the Federal Tax Return. Once you get your ITIN, you can file your state tax return.

It reduced our amount of tax owed by nearly $10,000 (vs. filing Single).

Hollow Point

was this w-7 filed while your wife was still in the philippines?

i need to figure out the best form of ID to submit with our w-7

Yes you can, I got back an extra $6000.00 on my return when I added my wife

richard,

did your wife get an ITIN?

and if so what kind of proof of id did you submit with the W-7?

We need help from someone who currently has or had a ITIN issued by the U.S.

My wife lives in the Philippines and we just submitted the i-130 a few days ago, but it is tax time, and i would like to file jointly.

she needs a certified copy of her passport for me to submit the form W-7

some people have told us to just notarize it, but the instructions for the W-7 say its not good enough because the Philippines is not party to the hauge convention.

Please let me know if anyone has any experience getting this true copy of the passport, and if so how did you do it?

or was the Philippine notary public stamp good enough to get an ITIN.

thank you.

mike.