Showing posts with label USCIS. Show all posts
Showing posts with label USCIS. Show all posts

Friday, 26 June 2009

The Interview Letter - in detail (part two)

The rest of page two tells you that your case has now moved beyond the NVC and, if you have any questions, you should now only communicate with the US embassy. You are given the address of the embassy and are told what details (Case number, Principal Applicant, Category & "Foreign State of Chargeability*") to include when communicating.

The third and final page is entitled "Notice to Visa Applicants".

There's a subheading "Visa Interview Requirements" that I will copy (almost) verbatim.
VLAD THE IMPALA must bring the following to the visa interview:
  • Any original documents that were requested by the NVC but were not submitted to the NVC
  • The medical examination results if not submitted to the Embassy/Consulate by the physician
  • The correct size and number of photographs
  • Valid passport for all traveling applicants
Point three is beautifully vague.

Finally there is a very scary looking table of "documents requested" that (in my case) names seventeen documents needed for the interview. Each document has a code letter by it. As most of my original documents were sent to the NVC (or the USCIS) this is a little intimidating.

Then you look up the codes. Basically you're looking for codes 'A' (to be acquired), 'I' (is incomplete) 'T' (translation needed) or 'S' (scanned document received), though a 'U' (document unavailable) is pretty scary too. My application had none of these codes - mine was full of F's, O's and Y's ("not required", "original document already submitted" and "document received and accepted").

I also had a document status of 'C' for a document called "Correspondence Instructions" - this was not explained in the notes. I have to assume that, as this was the first document named, that it's self-referential and is talking about the interview letter itself (as that has to be brought to the interview).

And that's about it...


*is that a real word? Really?

Saturday, 2 May 2009

The Waiting Game

Obviously, the trick I've used before of resigning myself to waiting a long time for results, only for the NVC or USCIS to respond almost instantly, isn't going to work again but I'm trying it anyway. According to their automated update system, the NVC generated the next pack for us a day after Foof paid online (I assume it's my DS-230 pack and not the tax stuff for Foofer) but they stated that it could take some weeks to reach us.

As we have all of our paperwork filled in (or filled out if you're on the western side of the Atlantic) in advance and our documents (both original and certified copies) ready, we have nothing left to do at the moment except to spend hours on Skype chatting to each other, waiting for things to arrive in the mail.

And sometimes the mail at Foof's apartment complex gets screwed up.

So we wait.

Again.

Wednesday, 21 January 2009

Processing Aliens Faster, Better?

While we're on the subject of improving US immigration (and, yes, I'll be trying not to use the word "maybe" as much as in my previous post), workpermit.com has an article which indicates that Mr. Obama's reforms may not be such an uphill struggle (which is good news as he will be watched closely on this subject).

In the final year of the Bush administration, a record one million Americans were naturalised. If you also take into consideration that the USCIS is clearing its backlog of cases at an impressive rate (from 3.6 million cases in 2004 to 1.1 million last November (and, they say, 0 by October 2009)), maybe the new guy's job won't be quite so tough in this area at least.

Wednesday, 14 January 2009

The Windy City

The I-130 has arrived at the USCIS in Chicago.

YAY!!!

I feel a timer coming on.

Yes, yes it's totally unfair to do that, I know - but I'm gonna do it anyway...
(I updated the timeline too)

Tuesday, 13 January 2009

Timeline

So the timeline has now appeared on the right of the page. I'd like to say that it will grow pretty quickly but I'm more realistic than that. This may take a ridiculously long time.

Fortunately my wife is worth waiting for. (And I'll be seeing her in the spring, anyway)

Dates will be whatever they say on various documents, receipts, appointments. I'm not going to get anal about global time differences.

Speaking of which - Note that the times on this page are all US Pacific times. Just in case you thought that I was keeping really wacky hours in the UK (or doing this at work).

Oh, and I'll arrange a timer once the USPS has confirmed that the I-130 is in the hands of the USCIS