LOST OUR FILE AT THE INTERVIEW

[Princess&Brit 7]

OK, so not exactly true, they knew where it was but our interview was in Salt Lake City and the file was in New York. I'm telling you this because I want to emphasize the importance of copying everything you send with your original application (the I-130 I-485 and everthing that goes with it etc) Here's what happened. We travelled overnight to Salt Lake City (a 5 hour car journey) for our 7.55 am appointment, staying in a hotel 3 blocks from the Immigration building, after all, they do stress the importance of being punctual, no more than 30 minutes early and certainly not late! So we got checked into the building and took a seat. A supervisor came out and called us forward and asked us to take a seat. (Supervisor? Why? I smell a rat straight away!) He starts off with "How are you?" "Nervous" says I, to which he replies "It's not good news I'm sorry to say." Well, it was at that point that the less-than-average hotel coffee and bagel breakfast nearly made a reappearance! It seems the day before, whilst trying to locate our file at the Salt Lake office, it and eleven other files were located sitting 2,173 miles away in New York. We were not notified of course, so we made the road trip and hotel stay as planned, only to be told we'd have to be rescheduled for 5 weeks out unless they got a cancellation or somehow managed to squeeze us in at short notice. Well, short notice wasn't going to work was it. Now I ask you. Wouldn't it have been common courtesy to try and stop us making that trip. They had our cell phone number, home number, work number, email. Not a word. And wasn't it a bit late trying to locate the file only the day before the interview? Our shock, horror and disappointment must've been written all over our faces, because the Supervisor said he was sorry! The file obviously contained all the information on the various forms and other such evidence pertaining to our application, and without that information the interview simply couldn't go ahead. Now I was a boy scout, and we're always prepared, so out of my bag comes not one, but two complete copies of every form and document we'd submitted, along with all original documents and all the additional evidence to support our application. Everything they needed was right there, bang, on the desk. Five minutes in conference with the interviewing officer and the Supervisor returned to say they would proceed there and then on the strength of the copies and evidence we had with us, "In an effort to accomodate you" So we scraped ourselves down off the ceiling and went into our interview, presented our case and were approved on the spot. She only skimmed over half of the evidence we had on our "bone fide" marriage before she said "Look, I'm just going to approve this." We have to wait for the original file to make it across the country before they can "rubber stamp" the approval, but thanks to forward planning and taking copies of every item we submitted with that original application we saved ourselves another 5 agonizing weeks or more of waiting (not to mention another 10 hour round road trip and a hotel stay)

God bless America, people! I'm here to stay!

[Harpa Timsah 13,258]

Awesome story! Good for you!

Lately I have heard people complaining about the VJ suggestion that they bring in a copy of their application, just in case. I have said to them that it is just good, smart record keeping, and they have balked. This is a perfect example of why being prepared is always worth it in the end.

You need a gold star.

[TBoneTX 45,325]

Bravo! Starting with the consular interview and proceeding through naturalization, it's better to bring something and not need it than to not bring it and wish that you had.

[SM & EF 41]

This has got to be one of the best stories I've read here. Congratulations!

[sdadams 8]

Congratulations!! (Mental note to bring my copies with us too!)

<-- that's my image of you, walking out of there cool as a cucumber!

[Princess&Brit 7]

Thank you all. Ya, I did feel like strutting out of there like that! LOL . . can't tell you what a relief it was to get that interview out of the way. This is what makes this site so valuable . . from experiences such as ours we are able to share the knowledge we each gain on our journeys and pass it on to others. There has been a wealth of time saving help on here for us, and it's nice to be able to give something back in the hope it saves someone else time and effort or a wasted journey. I only hope the other 11 missing files were back in SLC by the time the interviews were due for those couples.