I-130 Attorney?

[paitence 1]

I am a US citizen and I've been living with my husband in the UK for a little under 2 years now. We are filing our I-130 soon, and have gone through one of those really pricey advisers to get this job done. Sadly enough we don't find this company to be very helpful, as I've had to do everything on my own with very little guidance and funnily enough found more help doing my own research on forums like this than just getting the straight forward from the adviser. You have to ask yourself, "If I'm spending this much money on someone that's supposed to be an expert, then why am I finding myself on a public forum to get answers to questions he is supposed to answer", right? Any way.. We are all squared away with the I-130 and the supporting documents. Everything seems like it is ready to be filed and sent away, but we were informed that we will need to send our forms to this guy in the UK so he could send it to an attorney in New York so he could sign the papers, then send the forms back to our adviser in the UK, so he could file them directly to the US embassy in London. Now, does this seem like a lot of time wasted to you, or is it something that should be done? I want these forms filed as soon as I can, and that would be tomorrow if I knew that I didn't need the G-28 to be signed. Because looking at the time line now, if I do what I'm being advised to do, it could add an extra 2 weeks to the process. Where as, I could just send the papers off to the embassy tomorrow and be done with it and have piece of mind that the papers arrived no more than 2-3 days later.

Our marriage isn't really anything out of the ordinary besides the fact that we're from different countries.

We have been married for 2 years and lived a normal life, had a baby etc. We have more than enough proof of bonafied marriage and I think the attorney thing is just one extra thing that we could maybe get away without having?

Any one with some good advise on this topic?

[Ryan H 3,812]

Moved from Bringing Family Members of US Citizens to America forum to DCF Discussion as this is the method of of filing the OP plans to pursue.

**Organizer hat off**

Based on what you have posted, my 2 cents is to dump the adviser and file the petition yourself. If you feel that you don't need an attorney to handle your case, then don't get one.

[Nich-Nick 3,354]

Skip the two middlemen. Nobody is as concerned with timelines on your case as much as you are. Two weeks lost is ultra conservative. It's however long they each take to get around to doing their part. It's unlikely to be same day service. A G-28 can mean any hiccups are routed through the lawyer who must get around to routing to you to fix and back to him to respond. I'm talking about simple mistakes like forgetting to sign a page or tick a box. Why not just get it at your home, fix it, and straight back to London?

[LauraDP 10]

Since your case seems pretty straightforward I would imagine it is much more sensible and cost-effective to just do all of the paperwork yourself. Personally, I think the folks on this forum are so incredibly knowledgeable and helpful that you will find answers to all of your questions on here instead of paying a lawyer to give you the same information.

Best wishes

Laura

[GlobeHopperMama 95]

I personally don't think you need an attorney based on what you've described, but if you're going to use one, you should be working DIRECTLY with an attorney, not through some adviser who sends your stuff to an attorney. That's madness and way too many delays.

[Holly2234 66]

I actually think you would be better off not having that form signed. Everything will come through you then you have control of your timeline as much as possible.

[Darnell 8,478]

IF YOU HAVE your casefile in hand,

and IF you not file a G-28

then don't involve these middlemen, at all.

<EOM>