K1 and K2 AOS a few questions

[kuhio 1]

My fiancee and her 4 year old daughter got their K1 and K2 visas in January after about a year and a half process for the visas because we needed an I-601 waiver. Long process, but in the end we were successful. Due to the waiver issues, our K1/K2 was lawyer filed. I am now trying to complete the AOS portion myself. My fiancee and daughter entered the US in January and we were married in February. Since my wife is not planning on working and I had a bit of an illness that required some minor but important surgery, we have not yet filed our AOS paperwork. The I-94 expired at the beginning of April. I understand it is not required that we file our paperwork for AOS during the 90 day period but also not really good to delay too long because overstay starts to accrue.

Since we had to get a waiver, more than 1 year has passed since their medicals were done for the visa so we went ahead and went to a Civil Surgeon after having all of their vaccinations updated on my insurance at their regular doctors. This cost $210 for both of them and the doctor gave us back sealed envelopes for each of them as well as copies of the I-693's. With this done I think we are ready to file. After looking at the guides on here and browsing threads on AOS I am left with a few questions that I was hoping someone could help out with.

1) I do not have our NOA2. My K1 was lawyer filed and all documents were supposed to be copied to my lawyer. He also did not receive my NOA2. I found out about our I129-F approval through text message and the USCIS website. (Truth be told during the K1/K2 process I did not receive even 1 piece of mail at my US address.) I brought this up with my lawyer obviously needing the NOA2 to file AOS and he said it was no problem just include the print out from the website which shows the I129-F approval with our WAC#. The website indeed does show this when I look up our WAC#. My lawyer did receive our NOA1 during the K1 process. I was thinking of including our NOA1, a copy of the USCIS webpage that shows the approval, a copy of the K1 visa, and a letter from my lawyer stating that he never received our NOA2 in lieu of the NOA2 document. Do you think this will be sufficient?

2) Because we have no NOA2, I do not have an A# for my wife. I also looked at the I-94 and the visa but do not see an A# there either. On my step daughters I-94 there is a number handwritten on the I-94 that appears to be an A#. I assumed this was my step daughters A#. In light of this, what should I put on the forms where they ask for the A#? At the Civil Surgeon, we wrote the number that was written on my step daughters I-94 on each page of her I-693. My wife's I-94 has no similar # written on it.

3) I am going to send the paperwork for both my wife and step daughter in the same packet. I understand that for my step daughter (who is 4 years old) I need to supply a separate G-325a, I-485, I-765, I-131, and G-1145, right? Do I need to supply a separate I-864 for my step daughter?

4) Is it ok to staple the pages of each individual form together and then paper clip any "evidence" documents to each form or should I just not staple anything?

5) The total fees should be $985+$85+$635 = $1705, correct? I can just make out one check for $1705 right?

Thanks in advance for any replies?

[StvM 1]

My fiancee and her 4 year old daughter got their K1 and K2 visas in January after about a year and a half process for the visas because we needed an I-601 waiver. Long process, but in the end we were successful. Due to the waiver issues, our K1/K2 was lawyer filed. I am now trying to complete the AOS portion myself. My fiancee and daughter entered the US in January and we were married in February. Since my wife is not planning on working and I had a bit of an illness that required some minor but important surgery, we have not yet filed our AOS paperwork. The I-94 expired at the beginning of April. I understand it is not required that we file our paperwork for AOS during the 90 day period but also not really good to delay too long because overstay starts to accrue.

Since we had to get a waiver, more than 1 year has passed since their medicals were done for the visa so we went ahead and went to a Civil Surgeon after having all of their vaccinations updated on my insurance at their regular doctors. This cost $210 for both of them and the doctor gave us back sealed envelopes for each of them as well as copies of the I-693's. With this done I think we are ready to file. After looking at the guides on here and browsing threads on AOS I am left with a few questions that I was hoping someone could help out with.

1) I do not have our NOA2. My K1 was lawyer filed and all documents were supposed to be copied to my lawyer. He also did not receive my NOA2. I found out about our I129-F approval through text message and the USCIS website. (Truth be told during the K1/K2 process I did not receive even 1 piece of mail at my US address.) I brought this up with my lawyer obviously needing the NOA2 to file AOS and he said it was no problem just include the print out from the website which shows the I129-F approval with our WAC#. The website indeed does show this when I look up our WAC#. My lawyer did receive our NOA1 during the K1 process. I was thinking of including our NOA1, a copy of the USCIS webpage that shows the approval, a copy of the K1 visa, and a letter from my lawyer stating that he never received our NOA2 in lieu of the NOA2 document. Do you think this will be sufficient?

2) Because we have no NOA2, I do not have an A# for my wife. I also looked at the I-94 and the visa but do not see an A# there either. On my step daughters I-94 there is a number handwritten on the I-94 that appears to be an A#. I assumed this was my step daughters A#. In light of this, what should I put on the forms where they ask for the A#? At the Civil Surgeon, we wrote the number that was written on my step daughters I-94 on each page of her I-693. My wife's I-94 has no similar # written on it.

3) I am going to send the paperwork for both my wife and step daughter in the same packet. I understand that for my step daughter (who is 4 years old) I need to supply a separate G-325a, I-485, I-765, I-131, and G-1145, right? Do I need to supply a separate I-864 for my step daughter?

4) Is it ok to staple the pages of each individual form together and then paper clip any "evidence" documents to each form or should I just not staple anything?

5) The total fees should be $985+$85+$635 = $1705, correct? I can just make out one check for $1705 right?

Thanks in advance for any replies?

Well.., most likely your attorney received NOA2 on your behalf, and, somehow mispaced it. You can order replacement from USCIS. Since instructions call for it - I'm not sure if web based copy will be accepted.

As to A#.... most likely, by mistake, at POE they wrote your wife number on daughter's I-94. K-2 don't get their A# until AOS filing. You need to double check it, if you put a wrong # on I-693, it might create problems down the road.

As to check - $1705 is correct amount, and one check is fine, we did it same way and yesterday it cleared through bank, no issues there.

Edited May 8, 2012 by StvM

[kuhio 1]

Well.., most likely your attorney received NOA2 on your behalf, and, somehow mispaced it. You can order replacement from USCIS. Since instructions call for it - I'm not sure if web based copy will be accepted.

As to A#.... most likely, by mistake, at POE they wrote your wife number on daughter's I-94. K-2 don't get their A# until AOS filing. You need to double check it, if you put a wrong # on I-693, it might create problems down the road.

As to check - $1705 is correct amount, and one check is fine, we did it same way and yesterday it cleared through bank, no issues there.

I am pretty sure my lawyer did not misplace the NOA2. He does hundreds of K1's per year and commonly does not receive NOA2 because the USCIS messes up. He is in Thailand though and it may have gotten lost in the mail there. The process of getting a new NOA2 costs hundreds of dollars and takes months. There is no way I am going to pay hundreds of dollars to the USCIS for them to send a document to me only to have me resubmit it to them. The absurdity of that is pretty much comical. Especially since the K1 visa is proof that the I129-F had to have gotten approved and their own website says its approved. Thanks for the info though. I briefly looked into getting a new NOA2 but the inquiry pretty much stopped when I saw the outrageous fee. Also, given that it would take months just to process the form and get me the NOA2 there is a good chance I would not be able to file AOS until after my wife has been over 180 days which would make it so we could not file for AP. My wife has an elderly mother in Thailand and I already feel I am treading on dangerous ground since if her Mom were to get sick there is no way for my wife to go back.

For the A#, how can I check to see if the POE made this mistake? Just call the USCIS and ask? The I-693's for both my wife and stepdaughter are already in sealed envelopes from the doctor. I would have to go back to the doctor and get him to redo my stepdaughters forms to change this.

Thanks for the confirmation on the fees.

If anyone has more info on what to supply when you don't have an NOA2 I would appreciate it. I have seen some cases on here where people did not supply NOA2 with their AOS and had no problem, I think.

[Andy and Pui 16]

About the A# you can always make an info pass and ask them. Back in December when Pui got her emergancy AP we also talked to them about her A# because she received two of them. One on the NOA2 during the K1 process and on the NOA1 during the AOS process. They told us to use the A# from the NOA1 from the AOS and to ask about it at our interview. We still have yet to receive the greencard or get an interview for AOS.

[kuhio 1]

About the A# you can always make an info pass and ask them. Back in December when Pui got her emergancy AP we also talked to them about her A# because she received two of them. One on the NOA2 during the K1 process and on the NOA1 during the AOS process. They told us to use the A# from the NOA1 from the AOS and to ask about it at our interview. We still have yet to receive the greencard or get an interview for AOS.

Hi Thanks. I made an infopass appt for this Friday. I called the USCIS customer service and they said I need in infopass to get the A# situation sorted out. They also said that the printout from the internet showing the approved I129-F and our WAC# is proof that the I-129F was approved. Will take that with a grain of salt though. I will for sure ask about that at the infopass appt this Friday.

Edited May 8, 2012 by kuhio

[kuhio 1]

At the infopass, I was able to get both of their A#'s. POE had indeed written my wife's A# in my stepdaughters passport. That said, my step daughter does already have an A# so I will be able to get that as well.

So this means that the A# I wrote on my step daughters I-693 was my wife's A# and on my wife's I-693 I did not put an A# at all. The infopass officer said I should just include a letter which explains the situation regarding my wife's # being in my step daughters passport and that I subsequently went to an infopass to clear it up after we had already completed the I-693's and to just submit the forms as is. I am going to see if I can get the doctor to issue me new forms that corrects them anyway. If he wants to charge me again then I will just do what the info pass officer says.

Regarding the missing NOA, the info pass officer also thinks my lawyer just lost it. I don't really care what happened to it but the fact is I don't have it. The office told me to just apply with the docs I had (internet print out, K1 visa, NOA1 etc) and then gave me a form G-639 (Freedom of Information/Privacy Act Request) . Told me to file this form to get our NOA2 so that we have it later should we end up needing it. At least it would allow us to file for AP without going over the 6 month unlawful presence limit.

[VanessaTony 3,567]

Re the NOA2, just send a copy of the NVC letter (with the case number on it). Lots of people do this without issue.