Applied for AOS in August, still in Acceptance

[Larry_and_Xinji 1]

Hi all,

In short, my wife arrived here on K1 in July, married in August and submitted 485 for AOS concurrently with 765 and 121 for EA and AP by the end of August. She did biometrics in September and she received her EA and AP combo card about a week ago. So it's been about 2.5 months since our I-485 was received, yet if I check its status online it still only says Acceptance, even though the receipt numbers for EA and AP show them having gone through all the stages.

My question, is it normal for the I-485 to not even be under initial review? I am in Pennsylvania and am not sure if Pittsburgh or Philadelphia will be my local office, but both say 4 month processing times. Still I would expect it to be under review?

Most of the details of our visa journey are in my signature below or you can view the full timeline of course.

I'm itching to know because I am going out of the country for December basically then we will both go out of the country for most of February and March. It would be nice if we at least knew the interview date or something.

Thanks for your help,

Larry and Xinji

[didopage 337]

Totally normal about the "Acceptance" stage, it does the same thing to everybody.

On the other hand, nothing you can do about not yet knowing when your wife will have her interview, if she is scheduled for one. It is possible that she receives a straight approval if her case is chosen to be interview-waived (and so, stays at NBC and is not sent to a local USCIS office).

There's nothing you can do but wait and see. If you both plan to be out of the country for a while, it would be good to have someone to check your mailbox... and be ready to come back in the US if an interview is scheduled.

Hopefully, you will have news before your trips...

[bigdog 376]

Check the local time line for your interview time line and it should be within 2-3 months after you get your AP as I recall. Brave man to travel on AP, we stayed home until GC arrived. Yes I am paranoid. Have a great trip.

[Sunnyland 639]

Hi all,

In short, my wife arrived here on K1 in July, married in August and submitted 485 for AOS concurrently with 765 and 121 for EA and AP by the end of August. She did biometrics in September and she received her EA and AP combo card about a week ago. So it's been about 2.5 months since our I-485 was received, yet if I check its status online it still only says Acceptance, even though the receipt numbers for EA and AP show them having gone through all the stages.

My question, is it normal for the I-485 to not even be under initial review? I am in Pennsylvania and am not sure if Pittsburgh or Philadelphia will be my local office, but both say 4 month processing times. Still I would expect it to be under review?

Most of the details of our visa journey are in my signature below or you can view the full timeline of course.

I'm itching to know because I am going out of the country for December basically then we will both go out of the country for most of February and March. It would be nice if we at least knew the interview date or something.

Thanks for your help,

Larry and Xinji

If your case was not transferred to CSC (which normally delays the process more) maybe you guys will have an interview and your case has a shorter processing time than the cases that have been transferred to CSC. The USCIS update system is not very accurate. I already received my EAD-AP card in August and still displays that they mailed me a notice that they have approved the I131 APPLICATION FOR USCIS TRAVEL DOCUMENT.

I filed for AOS in May 2012 and still waiting for GC approval or interview so guys you will have to wait a few more months I guess. Waiting stinks but at least you are together already.

As for going out of the country, you still can go. Your wife will have to take with her: AP (which I guess she has the EAD-AP combo card) and marriage certificate. This last one will help the airport staff to match her passport name (maiden) to her new married name in the AP. In case she has her married name in EAD-AP documents.

There is nothing wrong in traveling with your Advance Parole, I will do the same thing in 2 weeks! As I was having my doubts too I went to an InfoPass appointment to a local USCIS office to make sure all should be OK with my trip and length of my stay in my country and they said I can travel using the AP while I wait for the GC. That I have to bring my marriage cert of course and any important document related to my AOS pending.

Edited November 15, 2012 by Chris & Isa

[didopage 337]

OP's wife filed after August 1st, and since August 1st, cases that are chosen to be waived from an interview are not transferred to CSC anymore. They stay at NBC and are adjudicated here.

Or the case will be scheduled for an interview, and be transferred to a local USCIS office.

[Pitaya 2,577]

Check the local time line for your interview time line and it should be within 2-3 months after you get your AP as I recall. Brave man to travel on AP, we stayed home until GC arrived. Yes I am paranoid. Have a great trip.

Strange turn of events for you. Agree with didopage and bigdog.

Good luck on your immigration journey and upcoming travel.

[Larry_and_Xinji 1]

OP's wife filed after August 1st, and since August 1st, cases that are chosen to be waived from an interview are not transferred to CSC anymore. They stay at NBC and are adjudicated here.

Or the case will be scheduled for an interview, and be transferred to a local USCIS office.

Hi all, thanks for the replies, it really sounds like I just need to wait. I'm interested in the above quote - does somebody have a link about that? Our case is pretty straight forward and never had any problems so if any case would not have an interview it might be us. How often does that happen?

Mail will be forwarded while I'm away to my mother - that worked last time when I received several of the 129F notices while I was out of the country by them being forwarded to her home.

I figure if the US government offers advanced parole that means you can use it! We have a unique opportunity where she can travel with me for my work and also become an employee of my university and finally get paid some money so that's really great! Living on a grad student stipend for two hasn't been easy.

I called NBC yesterday and they noted no problems but didn't really have much else either, just wait.

One last thing, we signed her up to get e-mail notifications on the 'my case status' website - will she get an e-mail about the interview? Is the spouse needed at the interview?

[Pitaya 2,577]

Hi all, thanks for the replies, it really sounds like I just need to wait. I'm interested in the above quote - does somebody have a link about that? Our case is pretty straight forward and never had any problems so if any case would not have an interview it might be us. How often does that happen? Hard to say, read some recent forum threads.

Mail will be forwarded while I'm away to my mother - that worked last time when I received several of the 129F notices while I was out of the country by them being forwarded to her home.

I figure if the US government offers advanced parole that means you can use it! We have a unique opportunity where she can travel with me for my work and also become an employee of my university and finally get paid some money so that's really great! Living on a grad student stipend for two hasn't been easy.

I called NBC yesterday and they noted no problems but didn't really have much else either, just wait.

One last thing, we signed her up to get e-mail notifications on the 'my case status' website - will she get an e-mail about the interview? In our case, we signed up for email and text notifications, we only got text notifications of the I-797c, not the contents of the notice. The notice was mailed. Is the spouse needed at the interview? Yes, your presence is required.

Happy holidays!

[didopage 337]

The link: http://www.visajourney.com/news/2012/09/30/workload-transfer-from-service-centers-to-field-operations/

I can tell you my case was very straight forward too, like many others, and I got an interview. Even then, the interview was very easy and quick, and didn't even look like an interview, but an appointment to check that everything was in order.

Cases that are waived from an interview are chosen quite randomly, I would say half AOS from K-1 don't have an interview, the other half have one.

Right now, I don't think I ever seen some AOS from K-1 cases approved by NBC since August 1st, so it's difficult to know what is the timeline for interview-waived cases.

If her case is scheduled for an interview, or approved, you should receive an update online. But the system sometimes doesn't work, it can get stuck and you don't see the update (on the website/email/text). It is not 100% reliable.

As replied by A&B, yes, the US spouse also needs to attend the interview.

Edited November 16, 2012 by didopage

[TBoneTX 46,015]

*** Thread shifted from main AOS/Family-Based forum to the Case Progress subforum. ***

[Larry_and_Xinji 1]

Online it still says only in Acceptance, not even in Initial Review. I will try calling again. She just got a visa to go to South Africa with me for 2 months. She already went on a cruise to the Bahamas with my sisters and re-entered with a new I-94 showing AOS with no problems.

Does this seem odd to anybody?

[Larry_and_Xinji 1]

Just in case, anybody digs this up, i had sent this recent as a PM:

hey, i called the help number and they gave me a little more info. i know the local field office for our case now, philadelphia. they also told me philadelphia is only processing applications from july 26 2012 (couple of days ago). that might mean they won't get to our application for another month, and like you said if they sent the interview letter then we'd have about a month to it or so. so, i'm not expecting the interview to be for 2 months then. that's how long we are out of the country, till march 22. so it might work out. the lady on the phone said since i had put the travel dates with the advanced parole application they might be waiting for that. we put that we would be back march 1, which is wrong now, but may have something to do with the delay of our case. she also said, when asked, that i would be able to change the date. i asked her, "do i have anything to be afraid of?" and she said "no."

[Villanelle 4,122]

The lady on the phone is only going to give you general information.

Your case is at the local office. They will send you an interview notice when they get to processing your case. How long that will take- no one can tell you. Some people wait a long time to be scheduled, others get interview notices rather quickly.

The phone rep was just speculating that perhaps theyre waiting to schedule you because they see you are out of the country until March 1. But trust me, USCIS does not work around YOUR schedule. You must work around theirs.

If for some reason you get the interview notice and you can not make it, because you or your spouse are out of the country (you both must attend) You need to contact USCIS and reschedule. You are allowed to reschedule if you have a legitimate reason. However theres no guarantee you wont wait a long time for your subsequently rescheduled interview.

[agrabs 241]

Just in case, anybody digs this up, i had sent this recent as a PM:

hey, i called the help number and they gave me a little more info. i know the local field office for our case now, philadelphia. they also told me philadelphia is only processing applications from july 26 2012 (couple of days ago). that might mean they won't get to our application for another month, and like you said if they sent the interview letter then we'd have about a month to it or so. so, i'm not expecting the interview to be for 2 months then. that's how long we are out of the country, till march 22. so it might work out. the lady on the phone said since i had put the travel dates with the advanced parole application they might be waiting for that. we put that we would be back march 1, which is wrong now, but may have something to do with the delay of our case. she also said, when asked, that i would be able to change the date. i asked her, "do i have anything to be afraid of?" and she said "no."

We sent in my husbands AOS 2 weeks after you and we are in the same spot you are. On line status still says initial acceptance. We got EAD/AP in November but still have not received an interview letter. We are at a different local field office but we were told that kansas city is only processing applications from July 28 2012. We have been wanting to plan a trip back home to Romania for my hubby but hate to do it until we know the interview date. This whole process has definitely been a lesson in patience for me!