Fiance Visa / Attorneys

[spookyturtle 9,465]

I'm a very experienced attorney (25+ years) who used a non-attorney service ($465) for my fiancee's K-1 just for the comfort level of having someone with direct experience make the submission. They were helpful in responding to a number of my e-mails, but I'm sure they didn't spend more than a couple of hours on this project. They did nothing that I couldn't have easily done myself. When we hit snags in the process, I had to handle them myself -- and I know that I was a lot more persistent and thorough than any law firm would have been or could afford to be. If you are of average intelligence, you can easily do this yourself. And as one of the other posters said, you are going to end up doing most of it yourself even if you use a law firm. There is no way that this process is so complicated or legally intensive as to warrant spending $2K or more on an attorney. Nor is there anything an attorney can do for you that is going to give you an advantage over other filers. I had a similar experience filing radiation "downwinders" claims with the Department of Justice (the program that pays $50K to $100K if you have cancer and lived downwind of nuclear testing in the 1950s and 60s). There are numerous law firms that charge $5K to $10K for handling these things, and you still have to do 75% of the work yourself. I handled two of them for relatives with no problems in a couple of hours, which makes $5K to $10K seem pretty silly.

You must not charge $250 per hour as many immigration lawyers do on the East Coast. I don't think there is any type of lawyer here that is under $175 per hour, most are $200. Plus copying and postal fees, of course. It is good to know that someone out there isn't out to get every dollar possible from their clients.

[Lancep 0]

That's my point, spookyturtle -- all lawyers have to charge something in the range of $175 to $400 an hour to cover the office space, secretaries, paralegals, equipment, etc., etc. So even if you are paying $2K, you aren't going to get much attention. I'm a salaried government lawyer, so I don't charge my clients anything. But if I had been charging someone $200 an hour for all the work that I put into my fiancee's K-1, it would have been a $10K project. There is no way that any law firm would have put the effort into resolving the inevitable problems that I put into them. If people think a paralegal at a law firm is going to put that kind of effort into their K-1, they are kidding themselves. If everything goes smoothly, the K-1 is a simple project for which $2K or $3K to a lawyer is too much (in my opinion). But if you encounter snags, $2K or $3K isn't going to buy the kind of time that resolving the problems will require. Our petition went into a black hole at the CSC for about 3 months after it had supposedly been sent to the NVC, then my fiancee encountered problems getting a visa from Belarus to Poland and had to reschedule her interview. I probably put $5K to $6K of "lawyer time" into those two snags alone.

[spookyturtle 9,465]

My experience with legal matters in general and especially where immigration has been concerned is an additional fee when problems are encountered. The lawyer quotes $2500, but it isn't a flat fee, soon it is $5000 due to snags. I have never been on the benefitting side where a lawyer did more and charged the estimated price.

I certainly agree that a lawyer could never put the time and energy into your case like you can. I was involved in the 601 wiaver process for almost 14 months. I used a highly regarded firm in Boston and I had multiple cost overruns and I also had consultations with 3 other other lawyers during the difficult part of this process. I left no stone unturned. I spent much more time on my case than the lawyer, and his fees were high, IMHO.

[robanddev 0]

darn knickerbocker

we hired him too!

i emailed him a trillion times with a ton of questions and i didn't get any answer lol. i ended up finding my own answers reading this VJ forum.

oh well...

[sara..... 371]

darn knickerbocker

we hired him too!

i emailed him a trillion times with a ton of questions and i didn't get any answer lol. i ended up finding my own answers reading this VJ forum.

oh well...

well im pretty fed up with him he promises the world and gives nothing in return......as long as we been going at this k1 mess he should have pulled out any resources he has to get this thing resolved and i will always believe if he had wrote a cover letter addressing the issues that we felt we needed an attorney for to begin with we would not be STILL waiting.................if i had found vj first before finding him we would already be married and waiting on change of status........................

[orchids 0]

Hi everyone

I just wanted to let you know that it is a bad idea to hire holmes&lolly immigration attorneys.

If you search web sites with "fiance visa," their web site comes up on top and you might think that they are trustable and professional. BUT, it's not a good idea to even call or e-mail them.

I used their service knowing there is cheaper services like usavisasnow for $600.

I called and they told me the estimate time of getting a VISA and it was a lie.

I said to my attorney, "what you are telling me is much longer than the first person who guided me to hire you."

And the response was "Well he just said that to speed up the process(of you hiring us.)"

I was surprised to know how they don't care about their job nor us.

They don't answer the phone, don't read e-mails, don't reply, the worst thing is that you expect them to know a lot more than you do, but they don't.

The paralegal guy was asking so many times for the papers I already sent.

I though he is brainless or/and blind.

K1 VISA is not that difficult to do it yourself. I hired them just because my fiance wasn't good at paper works, computers....etc

It actually slows down the process since you have to keep sending and receiving paper works.

I really recommend you to do the process yourself unless you have issues like criminal convictions or illegal stay in the US.

It's alreay hard being away from each other and I want nobody else to experience what happened to me.

Excuse my typos

I hope you have a great life with your loved one

Hello, I am sorry to hear that about Holmes and Lolly. They were pretty good when my friend went through them. The person who help him out did a lot of work. He would not know where to start. The initial time frame was about 9 months til visa issue and it was exact. So I guess it is the different paralegal that might be the issue. Who was your paralegal?

Joe

[Miami Vice 2]

I do want to warn people about Heather Poole Immigration Lawyer to for filing a simple K1 case. It will be a year now this november... She keeps on asking for information and documents taht we have sent already. We have asked her to return our documents and papers to us for roughly a month now.... Everything is just super slow.