How long for embassy to send passport with visa after approval?

[cereal 84]

The fiancée thankfully had a successful interview last monday at the London embassy. She didn't have original documents, was told she needed them, but the man at the interview window told her that he was going to go ahead and approve her, took her passport, and told her to look out for some sort of contact from the courier service.

It's been almost a week now and we haven't heard anything. Perhaps that's normal, perhaps it isn't -- I don't really know. I tried searching the forums to see if there were any posts that would give me a general idea of how long the turnaround time is for receiving the passport with visa from the embassy after the approval, but couldn't find anything. So if anyone has any information about this, I'd love to hear it.

Thank you.

[Pitaya 2,577]

~~Moved from K-1 Process to K-1 Progress Forum~~

[lost_at_sea 995]

What does your CEAC status say?

Are you 100% sure the embassy is not waiting on your original forms? They will "approve" visas while they await missing paperwork.

CEAC will say "Issued" when your passport has had your visa added, then take maybe 5 days to be in your hand from then. There have been some very recent changes to the courier system at London though, so predictions are going to be vague for a while on here. Checking CEAC is a good place to start.

Edited August 4, 2013 by lost_at_sea

[cereal 84]

What does your CEAC status say?

Are you 100% sure the embassy is not waiting on your original forms? They will "approve" visas while they await missing paperwork.

CEAC will say "Issued" when your passport has had your visa added, then take maybe 5 days to be in your hand from then. There have been some very recent changes to the courier system at London though, so predictions are going to be vague for a while on here. Checking CEAC is a good place to start.

Ah, did not know about the CEAC status. Our says "Ready" and it has been a week since her interview. It also says our case was updated on August 2nd, and her interview was on July 29th, so perhaps they are waiting for the documents.

Edited August 5, 2013 by cereal

[cereal 84]

After some searching, I'm afraid we may be in Administrative Processing. She holds a UK passport and I a US passport, but both sets of our parents are from Egypt, so maybe that's set off an alarm or two.

[cereal 84]

Yep, as of today, we're in AP. Wonderful. Several more months added to the wait.

[cereal 84]

Status changed again to "Issued", so I'm hoping that's that and we'll be receiving the visa in a few days.

[lost_at_sea 995]

Yeah. AP for even a few days can be considered normal paperwork processing, but that it's gone to issued is great! Should be on the way back shortly.

[cereal 84]

Yeah. AP for even a few days can be considered normal paperwork processing, but that it's gone to issued is great! Should be on the way back shortly.

Thanks! I'm still a bit apprehensive. I don't think I'll be fully celebrating until the visa is in hand and she's finally entered The States. Looking at your timeline, we should've gone the I-130 route. We filed the K-1 on July 20, 2012...