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Belgium US Consulate Reviews
Average Rating: 4.4
/ 5
84 Review(s)
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| Belgium |  Review #33140 on April 24, 2024: |
Benny1337
Rating: 
Click here if you found this review helpful | Review Topic: IR-1/CR-1 Visa
Had my appointment at 8:15am, was let in at the gates at 7:55am.
Passed through security, they require you to empty your pockets and take off your belt, watch and jacket.
This all gets X-rayed.
(Car)keys are not permitted, so they kept them in a numbered box and gave you a piece of paper to retrieve if after the interview.
You go up to booth 5, which is labeled cashier, with your passport and DS-260 confirmation page, which then gets scanned.
You’re given a number and told to go to whichever booth is displayed on the screen, next to your number.
This employee looks at your civil documents, confirms a few things and takes your fingerprints.
You’re then told to sit back down and wait until your number gets called again.
This time you go to a US official that takes your interview.
They make you take an oath, check your documents again, then ask you a few questions.
In my case these were: What job my wife does, what job I do, how we met, when we first met in person and when we last met in person.
There was some small-talk in between the questions, it’s all a fairly relaxed experience.
I was also given a document to sign confirming my knowledge of it being a conditional permanent residency, and a little paper with information about if you’d fall victim to domestic abuse.
After this, the officer mentioned I was approved and should get an email with further information about the tracking of my passport.
You leave the building, retrieve your kept items, and head out into the street.
| | | Belgium | Review #31784 on February 10, 2023: |
Artuicune
Rating: 
· 1 person found this review helpful
Click here if you found this review helpful | Review Topic: K1 Visa
Overall, everything went pretty smoothly.
I arrived about 35 min early, so I had to wait until 15 min before the scheduled meeting to be let in at the gate. Once inside you go through a scanner. You cannot take car keys or large bags inside, but you can leave them there at check-in and pick them up on your way out. Inside, I queued for 15-20 min for initial processing by a Belgian employee. He checked all my documents and was very nice and helpful in doing so. He even gave back the proof of financial support I prepared (bank statements, proof of income,...), since it was not needed at this stage. He said it is always better to not submit anything that is not required, as it might do more harm than good. Afterward, I was instructed to sit down and wait for the actual interview with an American agent at another booth.
I only had to wait 10 min more before I was called up for the interview. The agent did not ask many questions, just the name of my fiancé and some other very basic questions I cannot exactly remember. It was over in about 10 min. She said I was approved upon the requirement that my checks in the system (some kind of background checks maybe? the first agent started them, but they were not finished yet) would come through fine, but she did not expect any issues.
I had a special request: I was supposed to travel to the UK for work the week after, for which I needed my passport. The agent instructed me that the timeline would likely be too short to get the passport with visa back in time, so she gave me a paper (the same one they give you when you forget to bring something, basically an RFE) stating that I needed to bring my passport another time. It was no issue at all to do so, and I did not need a timed appointment for it, just to come in between 9-10 am (slightly annoying that it had to be between these times, which required me to come to Brussels during rush hour). I returned about a week later after my initial appointment to submit my passport. I got it back in 2 days (I paid for home delivery).
| | | Belgium | Review #31463 on October 3, 2022: |
MLA
Rating:
Click here if you found this review helpful | Review Topic: K1 Visa
The interview was 5 mintues, so my fiance told me. 4 questions. 1. How did you meet 2. Did you know your finace was married before? 3. What is her sons name? 4. When is the wedding?
And done. It is frusterating to lose so much time to processing, processing, processing, processing, just to get a 5 minute approval in the end, that really honestly, truly could have been approved much earlier if the immigration processes was better consolidated, and more effecient. but c'est la vie. My fiance said that the belgium office was simple to navigate, the interviewer was kind, and overall, it was a really easy process.
| | | Belgium | Review #31413 on September 7, 2022: |
Nika P
Rating:
Click here if you found this review helpful | Review Topic: IR-1/CR-1 Visa
Let me start by saying that, this year, the US Embassy in Brussels was very busy. The number of people that live in Brussels and want to immigrate to the US is large (this includes non-Belgian citizens), and because of the Ukraine-Russia war, a lot of Ukrainians pass through this embassy to immigrate to the US. Not only does this affect Brussels US Embassy processing times, but also the time it takes to get a medical appointment. This is made worse by the fact that recently the license of the doctor in Antwerp to do a medical check for the US Embassy has expired. So, if you are wondering why you can't book a medical appointment before your interview at the US Embassy, it is a combination of the following four things (according to Dr. Raphael Nardone):
1. Everyone goes through Brussels because it is one of the only available places in Belgium.
2. The war in Ukraine has increased the influx of immigration cases, and therefore also visa medical appointments.
3. Surrounding countries (NL, GE, FR) have either very costly medical appointments, or their next available appointment is much further away than ours. This brings citizens of those countries to Brussels.
4. There is still a lingering backlog from COVID.
The people at the Embassy are very nice. The website says you can't bring bags or electronic devices, but I brought my phone and my phone charger (to charge on the train) and that was fine. Other people brought bags, which was fine too. They did say that they won't let you in if you have a laptop with you. My guess is that, if you bring anything bigger than a cellphone, they probably won't let you in with that and you'll be screwed because there's no place to put it. When you get to the Embassy gate, you will need to wait a little bit if you're early. I had an appointment at 1:45 pm and could not enter until 1:30ish pm. The reason for this is that the lobby and office are not very big. If you do get there early, there is no place to sit or hide from rain outside, so bring whatever you need to stay comfortable. They will search you at the gate. Once you're cleared, you will walk inside and they will ask you to put your belongings in a box that will be x-rayed, and you will have to go through a metal detector. They gave me back almost everything from the box, but they kept my charger in a different box for safe-keeping and gave me a blue receipt to get it back later. Once I was let into the lobby, I had to wait for staff members to get to desks 6, 7 or 8 (almost felt like waiting at the airport). A guy showed up at desk 8 and handled my case. This is not the "interview" itself, this man was just responsible for checking if my original documents are the same as the ones uploaded on CEAC. Apparently, they want to see the exact documents you uploaded. If you're Belgian, you know that our background documents are all digital and digitally verifiable. That's why I requested new digital documents because the ones I uploaded on CEAC had expired. Don't do that. It creates more work for the person checking your documents. There is also a photo booth at the Embassy that takes your passport picture with the right dimensions for 5 euros (to the left when you enter the lobby). So, if you don't have a picture, don't worry. One thing that I had extra and was not on CEAC was the I-864 with 2021 taxes (on NVC I uploaded the I-864 with 2020 taxes). I had to give that too (with the 2021 W2). They kept the I-864s, the W2s, the marriage certificate, my birth record and my police record. Lastly, the person at the desk took my fingerprints and then told me to wait until my name was called by a Consular Officer. This person will give the interview. First, they make you swear an oath to tell the truth and nothing but the truth. You just talk about how you met and what you guys are intending to do with your lives. There's not much that can go wrong unless it is obvious you are trying to commit marriage fraud. They didn't even want to see any evidence of a relationship between us. (However, everyone's case is different so do bring yours.) In the end, the Consular Officer returned me my marriage certificate, birth and police record, and told me that once my documents were checked (probably the extra I-864 and W2 I submitted) they would print the visa and email me once they hand my passport to the courier service. I received two emails the next day, one from the Embassy that looks like this: https://i.imgur.com/ocXsziH and another from the courier service telling me my visa will arrive by the next day. So, the time between the interview and the passport + visa delivery can be as short as two days.
All in all, it took one year and a day for me to get my visa. Sept. 7th, 2021 was when we first started applying and Sept. 8th, 2022 is when we had the visa on-hand.
| | | Belgium | Review #29836 on July 9, 2021: |
jayjayk
Rating:
Click here if you found this review helpful | Review Topic: K1 Visa
Very fast, staff is extremely friendly and the interview was quick. I had the appointment at 2pm, arrived there around 1.40pm. then I was allowed to enter at 1.45 pm and by 2.40pm I was already done.
Questions asked:
- Tell me about your fiance and why are you here?
- What does he do for a job?
- Have you met his parents?
- How do you communicate?
- Do you have any pictures of you together?
- What is the plan once you get a visa?
- You were not married before, no kids?
- I was also asked about my J1
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