Picking K1 or IR/CR1

[Carlos&Alyssa 4]

Hi, I also met my Fiance while working on Cruise Ships...I decided to take the K-1 Route, only because we were not assigned to the same ship so I resigned and went home to wait the process out. If we had been together, we would have gotten married and filed the CR1, definitely!

I think the big question is, after she gets the Visa...do you plan on returning to ships? If not, I would definitely get married as you were planning and then file the CR1...if the interview can coordinate with her next vacation, great...but if not, she can just go home when its inerview time.

The thing to remember is, once you get your second notice of approval, you do have a certain amount of time to work with in which to schedule your interview...so even if you plan on staying on ships, you may be able to schedule the interview within a vacation. As long as you will be together during the process, might as well go the less expensive route that allows her to work right away after entering the country!

One more thing, I researched it alot before making our decision...its definitely not possible to adjust status from a C1D Visa.

Good luck!!

[Billious 32]

Hi, I also met my Fiance while working on Cruise Ships...I decided to take the K-1 Route, only because we were not assigned to the same ship so I resigned and went home to wait the process out. If we had been together, we would have gotten married and filed the CR1, definitely!

I think the big question is, after she gets the Visa...do you plan on returning to ships? If not, I would definitely get married as you were planning and then file the CR1...if the interview can coordinate with her next vacation, great...but if not, she can just go home when its inerview time.

The thing to remember is, once you get your second notice of approval, you do have a certain amount of time to work with in which to schedule your interview...so even if you plan on staying on ships, you may be able to schedule the interview within a vacation. As long as you will be together during the process, might as well go the less expensive route that allows her to work right away after entering the country!

One more thing, I researched it alot before making our decision...its definitely not possible to adjust status from a C1D Visa.

Good luck!!

Congrats to you guys, dare I ask which line you work(ed) for?

I'm leaning towards the K1 right now... my contract is only 4 months, and we'd be a month into it before we could even file for the CR-1. Even given best-case processing, it would mean 6 months after the end of our contracts where we're separated.

If I file K1 right now, when I join her on the ship in November, that'll be right around the time of NOA2... I'll be with her to help her get her end of things organized (and she brought pretty much everything she's going to need for NOA2 onboard with her). We can then work to time it out so that her medical and consular interview will happen back in Indonesia in late March or early April, leaving us apart only for about a month... Sure, then we'll have to do the AOS and all of that, but it realistically shouldn't cramp our style too much... if we go back to ship, it wouldn't be until the next winter anyhow - plenty of time to get the AOS taken care of.

Anything sound unrealistic or uninformed there? I'm looking for people to punch holes in my (admittedly weak) understanding of the process.

[PaulnUsa 19]

Hello everyone! I had the incredible luck of meeting my fiancee this last winter while working on a cruise ship with her, and we are planning on getting married this coming Winter. This is a moment of incredible joy for me, but I'm finding that our situation is sufficiently complicated to merit asking advice.

She is currently on a US work visa, but the ship she is on will not be back to a US port until November. I will join her on ship then for about 4 months, and we're hoping to get married down in the Caribbean somewhere (US Virgin Islands seems like a likely choice). We will both leave the ship in March, and she will come to my city here in the US for 10 days before she and I go to Indonesia for the inevitable family ceremony there. From there, we'd like to have her move here as soon as possible.

The question becomes whether to file for a Fiancee visa now, or to wait until we get married and file for an IR/CR-1. The complicating factor will be that there will be no reasonable way to schedule a US Embassy interview until our contract is done in early March (for all intents and purposes, it's impossible to schedule when she can get off the ship in port - in my position I have a lot more flexibility).

Further complicating (or helping?) matters is that she is technically "in the US" right now... She joined the ship in Florida, and will debark in Florida, and she had to obtain a work visa to do that. When her contract ends, her work visa gives her 10 days before she has to return to Indonesia. Is there any reason we might be able to skip the K1 and just do an adjustment of status after the wedding? For what it's worth, I think we should have no problem with the interview process, as neither of us has ever been married, she's got all the documents she should need with her, and we've got plenty of proof of a real relationship (I had an amazing visit with her friends and family over in Indonesia a few months ago!)

Any advice and information anyone can provide would be greatly appreciated. I've gone through the USCIS website, called them (a singularly unhelpful experience), and read through a number of posts here. Thanks in advance!

I would do CR1 because of her job. a k-1 does not let her leave the country right way if she would need to with work. With a CR1 she comes in as a permant citizen much more flexiblity