Arrrrg, resend?

[ThePirateStar 0]

My fiance said the bank said it was an Electronic Fund Transfer on the account. Do I believe this is from Homeland Security..or something else? He's at work right now so I can't really ask him about the entire conversation. This is what he told me last night: " It stated that the check has been pulled via EFT (Electronic Funds Transfer) from my account. No check number was used (IE: my check never cleared, it was eft'd)."

Either way..there's an inquiry on it..not sure if that will harm us or help us.

[Nik+Heather 121]

I agree, stay on top of it - because it is irregular to have to wait over two months to receive the first Notice of Action (NOA1) which indicates receipt of the packet.

Was your fiance watching for this? It comes in a regular sized envelope, only one (thick-ish) sheet of paper, looks just like any other junkmail/bill in the mail box.

Is there online banking with his checking account? If so, the scanned images of the check should be in there. On the back image, there will be the case number. (I think you know that) But if he can look online, then he doesn't have to depend on someone on the phone understanding his questions and telling him that.

Also, if there has been some sort of change in procedure recently, then the bank (or his online access) should be able to say who the payee was. Tell us who that is, and we can try to compare notes. I can't access ours at the moment, or I'd tell you.

Finally, as others have suggested, make an infopass appointment. Yes, it may mean missed work, but surely saving yourselves $455 is worth a few hours of missed work? He has to have the ability to get time off for personal business etc. But as others have pointed out, the people on the 1800 line frequently give flatly incorrect answers, but we have noticed somewhat better results when dealing with infopass appointments. They also seem to have quite a bit more power to do something.

Once you are sure that there is no way to find out if they have it, and all your evidence points to them not having it, THEN resend.

What a frustrating start to an already frustrating process! You sound like a reasonable and smart girl, so I'm sure you'll get through this speed bump better than many others would.

[ThePirateStar 0]

Thanks

As you can tell, there's a few problems with this whole thing.

He told me that he could not view the cheque online when I asked. He uses Bank of America, so I don't know if that makes a difference or not. When I keep prodding him about numbers on the cheque, he told me that the check was never endorsed and it was a straight EFT for the amount written on the cheque. He had an inquiry put on who made the EFT, but other than that, there isn't anything we can do. I am going to try and convince him to call the bank again and see if there's anything at all. As I said before, I am not even sure how an EFT works, and the fact that USCIS says they use EFTs but no one here can really agree if they do or not, the whole thing is utterly confusing.

As for the mail.. he has two addresses; his legal address isn't the same one he comes home to everyday. He checks his legal address once a week or so, and I told him that we should have gotten one. However, this isn't the first time the government has done this to him.. we had the same wait problem with his passport, where they said it was sent and it never showed up, and he had to get another one re-issued.

The other thing I wanted to ask.. if the bank says that it was Homeland Security that EFT'd the cheque..but they don't have a copy of that cheque for whatever reason, even though I am sure they must have something, how would we proceed to find out about our case if we don't even have a number to track by? Arrg. I am just hoping the Bank can tell us something but this whole thing has turned into a nightmare.

[bayojona3231 4]

EFT = Electronic Funds Transfer

When a cheque is cashed it's not an EFT. The USCIS does not use EFT.

When you give your employer your banking information and they deposit straight into your account thats an EFT. If you give your car insurance provider your banking information so they can withdraw your insurance payment monthly that is an EFT.

Your fiance definatly did the right thing freezing his account if he feels someone is wrongly making EFT's on his account.

Did you ship your I-129f with a tracking number?

Really? I'm really confused now, because on the instructions for the I-129f, it says

"Notice to Those Making Payment by Check. If you send us a check, it will be converted into an electronic funds transfer (EFT). This means we will copy your check and use the account information on it to electronically debit your account for the amount of the check. The debit from your account will usually take 24 hours, and will be shown on your regular account statement. You will not receive your original check back. We will destroy your original check, but we will keep a copy of it. If the EFT cannot be processed for technical reasons, you authorize us to process the copy in place of your original check. If the EFT cannot be completed because of insufficient funds, we may try to make the transfer up to two times."

He's blaming himself because I told him to send it through UPS or some other mail carrier with a tracking number, and he sent it regular mail :|

You are 100% correct. It is always good to send documents to any Government agency via certified or registered mail. That way, you can tract when it is delivered and who signed for it.

[Nik+Heather 121]

The other thing I wanted to ask.. if the bank says that it was Homeland Security that EFT'd the cheque..but they don't have a copy of that cheque for whatever reason, even though I am sure they must have something, how would we proceed to find out about our case if we don't even have a number to track by? Arrg. I am just hoping the Bank can tell us something but this whole thing has turned into a nightmare.

You'll have to make an Infopass Appointment.

It's completely different from simply calling into a call center. Call centers in general are fairly good at dealing with routine things. They want a case number. If you mess up this first step by not having a a case number, they are NO GOOD to you. With an infopass appointment, he's much more likely to get someone who can - and is willing to - look for his case by your names and birth dates. If he made a copy of the whole packet, then he can hand that over (in case of typo) to make sure they search for the same thing he sent in.

Once he goes to the infopass they can tell him if they can't even look it up without a case number (but that's dumb, I'm sure there are lots of people who don't get NOA1 for less nefarious reasons), then I guess you'll want to send it in again. The problem with sending in a second copy without exhausting these possibilities is that if it DID make it there and into the system, now you might have two petitions going, which might make things really difficult down the road. PLUS loosing an extra $455.

I wouldn't take the bank thing too much further. Even if the exact same characters were used in the description of the withdrawal as other VSC people, it's not going to put your mind at ease, so...

Thinking ahead, if you elect to resubmit, explain your situation in the cover letter to head off any problems in case your first petition did make it alright after all. You'll have to start over again, with original signatures on everything again.

[clueless_in_usa 8]

Two things I want to add to this topic:

1) The EFT statement on the instructions of the I-129F has been there at least from the beginning of the year, when I sent my own I-129F application

2) I was going to publish an image of the back of my check but decided not to because this is a public forum and the back clearly shows the case number. But the point is that my bank has a full image of the front and back of the check that was presented for payment. I don't know how they got the image, but it is there clearly visible.

In the back of the check you can see the following:

Stamp1:

For Deposit Only

USCIS

VSC

Stamp2:

For Credit to U.S. Treasury

DOJ/USINS X7 9420385374

<more numbers and letters>

EAC <case number>

[ThePirateStar 0]

Okay, just another question about the cheques.. on your bank account does it tell you if Homeland Security made the EFT, or is that the info you find out by viewing the check? I'm just curious because he says the bank told him it was just an EFT, and didn't say by who.

[Stephen + Elisha 92]

Two things I want to add to this topic:

1) The EFT statement on the instructions of the I-129F has been there at least from the beginning of the year, when I sent my own I-129F application

2) I was going to publish an image of the back of my check but decided not to because this is a public forum and the back clearly shows the case number. But the point is that my bank has a full image of the front and back of the check that was presented for payment. I don't know how they got the image, but it is there clearly visible.

In the back of the check you can see the following:

Stamp1:

For Deposit Only

USCIS

VSC

Stamp2:

For Credit to U.S. Treasury

DOJ/USINS X7 9420385374

<more numbers and letters>

EAC <case number>

Same here. This is because USCIS converts the checks to electronic "substitute checks" in accord with the provisions of the "Check 21" Act. The check is then "cashed" electronically by transmitting the image to your bank—rather than the former system of physically sending checks between banks by way of Federal Reserve branches and clearinghouses.

The Wikipedia pages on the Check 21 Act and substitute checks are very helpful on understanding this.

[Spoom 8]

I'm a little confused by the petitioner's bank here.

Does he not get check images for checks that are pulled from his account? Even if it is an EFT (the disclaimer for which has been on the form since at least February), in order to pull the funds they'd need a reason to create the EFT, and long story short, you should still have a check image. When your fiance logs into his bank (I assume he does online banking, where things such as check images are found), is there no check image with the transaction to remove the funds from the account?

I'd be pushing at your bank for this information first and foremost. I seriously doubt that someone was able to pull your petition from the mail and deposit the petitioner's money claiming that they were a DHS representative. That sounds like a really good way to get "disappeared".

More than likely it's a combination of two things: the USCIS doing what they always do and forgetting about the NOA1 in the mail room somewhere (as you can see in my signature, we got the letter from the State Department and had to call USCIS before we got the NOA2), and the bank not being able to furnish the check image for some reason.

I know back in the day I had to start an investigation about a check, and then eventually mailed me a photocopy of the check, both sides, with all stamps. So if I were you, I'd wait on your check investigation to finish, since you'll be able to see who cashed it and if it was cashed by USCIS (which I'm 90% certain it was), you'll get your EAC number.

Don't bother filing a new petition yet. If it turns out that someone did steal your funds, you'll have to do that, but you don't know yet.

Edited August 13, 2009 by Spoom