Lawyer Dilemma

[madbee626 0]

We hired a lawyer when we applied for our visa to avoid messing up in filling up the forms and whatnot... that was before I learned about VisaJourney website. If i had known about VJ before we filed, we shouldn't have hired a lawyer because 1. ours in not really a special case 2. they really did not do anything but send out the forms for us 3. the fee is totally a rip-off considering there are a lot here who can offer advice for free! Now, the thing is, we have not fully paid our lawyer half of the fee he is charging us and honestly, i don't think we want his services any longer. my questions are

- what are the proper ethics for this, should we still pay him whatever we owe him and then tell him we wont be needing him anymore? honestly, i could use the money for my one-way ticket to my loves

- he has the hard copy of our NOA1, if he wont give it to us, would it be okay not to have it(NOA1) during my interview?

as for NOA2, he sent us a PDF file of our NOA2 so i figure I can just print that out and that should be good as hard copy eh?

I'm sorry if my questions has really obvious answers.. i guess i just need to be very sure. Thank you and more power to you all.

[Gary and Alla 3,694]

We hired a lawyer when we applied for our visa to avoid messing up in filling up the forms and whatnot... that was before I learned about VisaJourney website. If i had known about VJ before we filed, we shouldn't have hired a lawyer because 1. ours in not really a special case 2. they really did not do anything but send out the forms for us 3. the fee is totally a rip-off considering there are a lot here who can offer advice for free! Now, the thing is, we have not fully paid our lawyer half of the fee he is charging us and honestly, i don't think we want his services any longer. my questions are

- what are the proper ethics for this, should we still pay him whatever we owe him and then tell him we wont be needing him anymore? honestly, i could use the money for my one-way ticket to my loves

- he has the hard copy of our NOA1, if he wont give it to us, would it be okay not to have it(NOA1) during my interview?

as for NOA2, he sent us a PDF file of our NOA2 so i figure I can just print that out and that should be good as hard copy eh?

I'm sorry if my questions has really obvious answers.. i guess i just need to be very sure. Thank you and more power to you all.

Sorry if I am not surprised. There simply is nothing an attorney can do for you but empty your wallet and fill out forms equivilent to a job application a Walmart.

Cancl his services now, do NOT pay any more money, retrieve your documents and fill out your own forms. Ethics? With an immigration attorney?

Let's see, they told you how their cases have better timelines than the USCIS, right? The USCIS timelines are useless and they know it. They told you the USCIS looks for ways to refuse these visas, right? They do not. He MUST give you your documents, if he does not, or even hesitates call the state BAR asociation from your cell phone in his office. DO NOT accept any hesitation or BS, these are products o your forms and he MUST give them to you. At any rate the NOA1 is a rather useless document, it is only an acknowledgement they have received your case, you will not need it for anything else in the process. Some may argue the number can be used to check your case status. Yeah, sure. I just checked mine. It says "received and pending" but my wife has her green card already. It is useless.

For the purpose of the interview and AOS the copy of the NOA2 will be acceptable. The consulate has the option of askig for the original, but I think they rarely do that. At any rate, you WILL be getting the originals from the attorney. If he says you must pay him more for the originals say "NO, give me the originals NOW and if you think I owe you more money...SUE ME!!!!!!"

We really need legislation to regulate these scavenger immigration attorneys. I mean we have the IMBRA statutes, why not something requiring these bottom feeders to disclose what they really do.

[madbee626 0]

just the kind of reply that i need to read! tHank you so much

to those who are considering hiring immigration lawyers, if yours is not a special case then you are better off doing it on your own. will save you a lot of money really. on our 2nd-4th month of waiting for NOA2, i have already spent a lot of time doing my own research here in visajourney and the more I learn and understand about the process I was like -- WTH did we pay that lawyer for. lol

anywhoo, good luck to everybody and God bless us all!