Our Interview Experience

[arleygirl 0]

Here is a status update.

We had our interview on Jan 31. Our appointment was at 10:30AM and we arrived around 9:45AM.

We only brought a minimal amount of "evidence" with us. My feeling was that, we are a legitimately married couple and if they didn't want to believe us, they were welcome to stop by and visit us in our 300 SqFt studio apartment. (There's no way 2 people who weren't intimately involved could peacefully co-exist in that small of a space.) Anyway, a good friend of mine is a former Customs and Border Patrol employee and she had told me prior to our interview, that sometimes couples can actually appear like they are trying too hard.

Here is a list of what we took:

Photo Album (including pics from our wedding, my birthday, Christmas, New Years Eve & an assortment of pictures from places we've gone together ie. beach, parks, restaurants, etc.)

Letter from Pastor (This letter was on church letterhead, and he discussed the fact that he preformed pre-marital counseling with us; that he was the one who had officiated our wedding and signed our marriage certificate; and that we attend church together as a couple and have as a couple been involved in various church functions/events.)

Bank Statements & Checkbook (with both of our names on them)

My updated Social Security Card and Drivers License (Showing my name change)

Guest Book from Wedding

Christmas Cards that had been mailed to us.

Full Copy of Submitted Paperwork

Original Marriage License

The agent that did our interview was very pleasant. She had no interest in seeing the Christmas Cards, when I went to get them out, she actually said, "I don't need to see those."

She asked questions, just verifying the information that we had put on our applications. She asked him the standard "Are you a terrorist?" questions.

She did ask me if I had a check stub with me because I had not submitted any with the application, and I told her "No, I did not have one with me. And the reason I didn't submit any with the application package was because the instructions clearly stated that as long as my previous year's federal income tax return paperwork was submitted and showed that I was above the required income level, that while check stubs could be submitted they were not necessary." She nodded her head, said "ok", wrote something down and then moved on to the next question.

She flipped through our photo album and asked who a few people were that were in our pictures.

She only asked one question that we thought was odd. She asked me (I am the US Citizen) if I have ever flown on a private plane. I answered "yes", she asked me when that was. I had to think about it....I have flown on private planes several times in the past, but the most recent time was about 17 years ago.

After that she said that everything looked good, and that as long as nothing came up before the start of the next business day then we should receive our approval letter in 2-4 weeks. I thought that was kind of a funny thing to say...what are the chances that at this point in the process some new, bad, red flag could come up? I mean, at this point, I'm sure they know more about me than I know about myself!

Anyway, my husband was a little anxious after we left, because he was worried that we weren't going to get approved. But I told him to relax, because if there had been even a slight possibility that they thought we weren't a legitimately married couple, then they would have asked us a heck of a lot more questions.

A week later, we received 2 pieces of mail. A letter to me, telling me that my petition for a family member had been approved! And one for him that said "Welcome to the United States of America!" A day later, another piece of mail, this one in a priority mail envelope...his Green Card had arrived!

That's our experience...from start to finish, less than 100 days. If there's anyone out there reading this who is just beginning this process, the one piece of advice I would give is to make sure that you complete the application, go over it multiple times with a fine tooth comb and make sure you include everything they request. (I used to respond to government RFIs and RFPs for a living, so this came natural to me.) If you include everything correctly, then hopefully your experience will go as smoothly as ours did.

Just a little tidbit of info...I filled out the form for electronic notification and included it with our application. I received text messages and emails informing me when our application was received, so I KNOW that the electronic notification request form WAS processed. However, after that, I never received another text or email notification. And the few times I checked online, there was never any info on our application. So if you're not hearing anything, try not to stress about it. Just because it's not updated online, doesn't mean that your status isn't progressing.

Edited February 19, 2013 by arleygirl

[Mariana2012 89]

Very helpful ! Thank you !

[Mikaela_jan 1]

Here is a status update.

We had our interview on Jan 31. Our appointment was at 10:30AM and we arrived around 9:45AM.

We only brought a minimal amount of "evidence" with us. My feeling was that, we are a legitimately married couple and if they didn't want to believe us, they were welcome to stop by and visit us in our 300 SqFt studio apartment. (There's no way 2 people who weren't intimately involved could peacefully co-exist in that small of a space.) Anyway, a good friend of mine is a former Customs and Border Patrol employee and she had told me prior to our interview, that sometimes couples can actually appear like they are trying too hard.

Here is a list of what we took:

Photo Album (including pics from our wedding, my birthday, Christmas, New Years Eve & an assortment of pictures from places we've gone together ie. beach, parks, restaurants, etc.)

Letter from Pastor (This letter was on church letterhead, and he discussed the fact that he preformed pre-marital counseling with us; that he was the one who had officiated our wedding and signed our marriage certificate; and that we attend church together as a couple and have as a couple been involved in various church functions/events.)

Bank Statements & Checkbook (with both of our names on them)

My updated Social Security Card and Drivers License (Showing my name change)

Guest Book from Wedding

Christmas Cards that had been mailed to us.

Full Copy of Submitted Paperwork

Original Marriage License

The agent that did our interview was very pleasant. She had no interest in seeing the Christmas Cards, when I went to get them out, she actually said, "I don't need to see those."

She asked questions, just verifying the information that we had put on our applications. She asked him the standard "Are you a terrorist?" questions.

She did ask me if I had a check stub with me because I had not submitted any with the application, and I told her "No, I did not have one with me. And the reason I didn't submit any with the application package was because the instructions clearly stated that as long as my previous year's federal income tax return paperwork was submitted and showed that I was above the required income level, that while check stubs could be submitted they were not necessary." She nodded her head, said "ok", wrote something down and then moved on to the next question.

She flipped through our photo album and asked who a few people were that were in our pictures.

She only asked one question that we thought was odd. She asked me (I am the US Citizen) if I have ever flown on a private plane. I answered "yes", she asked me when that was. I had to think about it....I have flown on private planes several times in the past, but the most recent time was about 17 years ago.

After that she said that everything looked good, and that as long as nothing came up before the start of the next business day then we should receive our approval letter in 2-4 weeks. I thought that was kind of a funny thing to say...what are the chances that at this point in the process some new, bad, red flag could come up? I mean, at this point, I'm sure they know more about me than I know about myself!

Anyway, my husband was a little anxious after we left, because he was worried that we weren't going to get approved. But I told him to relax, because if there had been even a slight possibility that they thought we weren't a legitimately married couple, then they would have asked us a heck of a lot more questions.

A week later, we received 2 pieces of mail. A letter to me, telling me that my petition for a family member had been approved! And one for him that said "Welcome to the United States of America!" A day later, another piece of mail, this one in a priority mail envelope...his Green Card had arrived!

That's our experience...from start to finish, less than 100 days. If there's anyone out there reading this who is just beginning this process, the one piece of advice I would give is to make sure that you complete the application, go over it multiple times with a fine tooth comb and make sure you include everything they request. (I used to respond to government RFIs and RFPs for a living, so this came natural to me.) If you include everything correctly, then hopefully your experience will go as smoothly as ours did.

Just a little tidbit of info...I filled out the form for electronic notification and included it with our application. I received text messages and emails informing me when our application was received, so I KNOW that the electronic notification request form WAS processed. However, after that, I never received another text or email notification. And the few times I checked online, there was never any info on our application. So if you're not hearing anything, try not to stress about it. Just because it's not updated online, doesn't mean that your status isn't progressing.

Congratulations!!! I am praying for God's intervention. It's been almost 7 months that I haven't heard anything from my AOS application. When checking online, it is still in acceptance stage. I don't know what's going on, but keeping my faith, and trusting God that it will be approve soon.

[Tintin and Mike 127]

Congrats!! :dance:

[X Factor 1,111]

Thanks for sharing

[ddkorestin 10]

very informative. thanks and congrats

[CarlaDave 27]

Congratulations! There was some great advice in there as well. Thank you!