I-601 WAIVER UPDATES

[Olabank 1]

18 minutes ago, Franco007 said:

Thanks and Uw..... Congrats too and i wish you luck with the embassy in Barbados.

Thank you 

 

[Devan 3]

On 4/3/2018 at 9:38 PM, Franco007 said:

My experience is ...........

 

Submitted I-601 on December 29, 2016 ........

Had multiple last updates which meant nothing really.....

I-601 waiver approved March 23, 2018....

U.S Consulate instruction email received April 3, 2018..... (said to resubmit DS-260, Medical and Police report... Not need for appoint, just do a walk in with copy of email from consulate)

 

Hoping to get all done and visa in hand by next week.

 

Good luck as you await yours.

 

Hello Franco, Congratulations on your approval. Long wait is finally over for you. Good luck with the rest of the process. Very happy for you.

[Olabank 1]

12 minutes ago, Devan said:

Hello Franco, Congratulations on your approval. Long wait is finally over for you. Good luck with the rest of the process. Very happy for you.

I submitted mine on dec 21 2016, and no update until when the approval letter came like a thief in the night..got it on 29th march and it was approved on 20th march. Uptil now, no update on uscis website or tracking app about the approval. The only thing I noticed was an update from uscis app that I installed on Google play..it says case updated on 20th march and when I check, it change from received to receive with the same application received date. Until when my wife received the approval letter which was a big surprise to us. Now waiting for embassy to continue the process. Hopefully soon.

[Devan 3]

1 minute ago, Olabank said:

I submitted mine on dec 21 2016, and no update until when the approval letter came like a thief in the night..got it on 29th march and it was approved on 20th march. Uptil now, no update on uscis website or tracking app about the approval. The only thing I noticed was an update from uscis app that I installed on Google play..it says case updated on 20th march and when I check, it change from received to receive with the same application received date. Until when my wife received the approval letter which was a big surprise to us. Now waiting for embassy to continue the process. Hopefully soon.

Congratulations on your approval. I see that the new tracking of processing time puts the applicants and petitioners in a complete darkness. We have no clue whatsoever when to expect it coming. All we have is the huge window of 13.5 to 18 months of waiting which is testing time for all of us. My case was received April 27th, 2017. Crawling almost there. I am happy that you heard your petition is approved and you will hopefully hear from the consulate very soon. Good luck for the interview and rest of the process.

[Olabank 1]

3 hours ago, Devan said:

Congratulations on your approval. I see that the new tracking of processing time puts the applicants and petitioners in a complete darkness. We have no clue whatsoever when to expect it coming. All we have is the huge window of 13.5 to 18 months of waiting which is testing time for all of us. My case was received April 27th, 2017. Crawling almost there. I am happy that you heard your petition is approved and you will hopefully hear from the consulate very soon. Good luck for the interview and rest of the process.

Thank you...dont worry..u will soon get there..it happen to me too 

[BKII 2]

On 4/3/2018 at 7:08 PM, Franco007 said:

My experience is ...........

 

Submitted I-601 on December 29, 2016 ........

Had multiple last updates which meant nothing really.....

I-601 waiver approved March 23, 2018....

U.S Consulate instruction email received April 3, 2018..... (said to resubmit DS-260, Medical and Police report... Not need for appoint, just do a walk in with copy of email from consulate)

 

Hoping to get all done and visa in hand by next week.

 

Good luck as you await yours.

 

congratulation  hop you will get the visa as soon as possible

i was hoping it would mean something after all -the last update-  but its look like its just to give us some hope

thankss for your replay

[Jen Chem 6]

I'll go ahead and share our experience so far off the top of my head...

 

Early 2015 - Started the immigrant visa process for my husband. He entered illegally about 12 years ago and had been in the US ever since- we had to get the 601-A and I-130 forms approved.

March 2017 - 601-A and I-130 both approved; we started the D-260, I-864 etc. Everything was done by late June I think. They requested original W2's from the I-864 to bring to the interview.

September 2017 finally received our interview date in Ciudad Juarez!

November 14 2017 - medical and fingerprint appointments (I recommend doing them on different days- we almost missed the biometrics appt!)

November 15 2017 - Visa appointment - denied due to "alien smuggling" because he had paid to have his son brought over 10 years ago (the son was only in the US 2 years). We were shocked and hadn't expected a denial at all. He received the 10 year ban on admission. My husband left to live with his parents in Mexico and I temporarily quit my doctorate program to work on the I-601 and watch our 1 and 3 year old sons in the US.

December 29 2017 - USCIS received our I-601 pardon request. We got a member of congress involved as well and I highly recommend this. Through the congressional involvement we were told to submit an expedite request, which my lawyer took care of. 

February 9 2018 - Not only was the expedite request approved a little over 2 weeks after submission, but the I-601 was approved!! We were told by USCIS that we would be hearing from the US consulate in Juarez. (They approved on the 9th and we got the approval letter on the 15th I think)

March 8 2018 - I e-mail our lawyer asking if we can follow up since it's been a month. She calls in and come to find out they sent a letter a week prior to our old lawyer that we had used for the first 601-A. They send an e-mail this time. Several days letter we finally get the copy of the letter they sent us. It asks us to send in my husband's passport, and tells us that we have until March 9th to change the location where our documents/packet will be returned.

 

Here's the thing- we had the ACS in Juarez named as our courier location because that's where we were at his first time around. But the lawyer's assistant called in and made it seem like we were supposed to hand-deliver his passport and that we should be approved with that really soon, so we decided that the following week while I had Spring Break from classes that I would travel down to Mexico and then as a family we would go up to Juarez, turn in the passport, and wait a couple of days for them to approve the visa and send back the packet. My babies had been with their father in Mexico since the end of the year because there was no way for me to pay their daycare and continue my doctorate program without his income in the US. Unfortunately for us, the Monday we got there (March 19) was a national holiday, so we waited a day just to find out that we had to send in his passport via an approved DHL location. 

 

March 21 2018 - DHL says the consulate received the passport

March 23 2018 - Consulate receives the passport in their system

March 28 and 29 2018 - More Mexican holidays, meaning no one at the consulate was working

 

April 8 2018 - Today, a Sunday. It's been 2 weeks and 2 days since the consulate received the passport in their system but only 8 business days due to the holidays. We purchased plane tickets for early Tuesday afternoon and we're going to fly back to my husband's parent's house if we don't hear back by then. We've been calling daily but the hotline can't tell us anything other than that an officer at the consulate received the passport on the 23rd and that they have everything they need and that average wait time is 2 weeks (but from what I have seen online from other people's experiences in Juarez is that it takes 1 week usually). I would rather stay until the end of the week and leave on Friday but my husband and I are both going a little crazy sitting around doing nothing cooped up with the kids in a strange place for 3 weeks, and I feel like we're just holding onto false hope with an officer at the consulate tugging at our heartstrings with our future on his desk. We are so close that we can take a 5 min walk and see the buildings in the US on the other side of the border. 

 

 

 

 

 

[Jtorres 2]

5 hours ago, Jen Chem said:

I'll go ahead and share our experience so far off the top of my head...

 

Early 2015 - Started the immigrant visa process for my husband. He entered illegally about 12 years ago and had been in the US ever since- we had to get the 601-A and I-130 forms approved.

March 2017 - 601-A and I-130 both approved; we started the D-260, I-864 etc. Everything was done by late June I think. They requested original W2's from the I-864 to bring to the interview.

September 2017 finally received our interview date in Ciudad Juarez!

November 14 2017 - medical and fingerprint appointments (I recommend doing them on different days- we almost missed the biometrics appt!)

November 15 2017 - Visa appointment - denied due to "alien smuggling" because he had paid to have his son brought over 10 years ago (the son was only in the US 2 years). We were shocked and hadn't expected a denial at all. He received the 10 year ban on admission. My husband left to live with his parents in Mexico and I temporarily quit my doctorate program to work on the I-601 and watch our 1 and 3 year old sons in the US.

December 29 2017 - USCIS received our I-601 pardon request. We got a member of congress involved as well and I highly recommend this. Through the congressional involvement we were told to submit an expedite request, which my lawyer took care of. 

February 9 2018 - Not only was the expedite request approved a little over 2 weeks after submission, but the I-601 was approved!! We were told by USCIS that we would be hearing from the US consulate in Juarez. (They approved on the 9th and we got the approval letter on the 15th I think)

March 8 2018 - I e-mail our lawyer asking if we can follow up since it's been a month. She calls in and come to find out they sent a letter a week prior to our old lawyer that we had used for the first 601-A. They send an e-mail this time. Several days letter we finally get the copy of the letter they sent us. It asks us to send in my husband's passport, and tells us that we have until March 9th to change the location where our documents/packet will be returned.

 

Here's the thing- we had the ACS in Juarez named as our courier location because that's where we were at his first time around. But the lawyer's assistant called in and made it seem like we were supposed to hand-deliver his passport and that we should be approved with that really soon, so we decided that the following week while I had Spring Break from classes that I would travel down to Mexico and then as a family we would go up to Juarez, turn in the passport, and wait a couple of days for them to approve the visa and send back the packet. My babies had been with their father in Mexico since the end of the year because there was no way for me to pay their daycare and continue my doctorate program without his income in the US. Unfortunately for us, the Monday we got there (March 19) was a national holiday, so we waited a day just to find out that we had to send in his passport via an approved DHL location. 

 

March 21 2018 - DHL says the consulate received the passport

March 23 2018 - Consulate receives the passport in their system

March 28 and 29 2018 - More Mexican holidays, meaning no one at the consulate was working

 

April 8 2018 - Today, a Sunday. It's been 2 weeks and 2 days since the consulate received the passport in their system but only 8 business days due to the holidays. We purchased plane tickets for early Tuesday afternoon and we're going to fly back to my husband's parent's house if we don't hear back by then. We've been calling daily but the hotline can't tell us anything other than that an officer at the consulate received the passport on the 23rd and that they have everything they need and that average wait time is 2 weeks (but from what I have seen online from other people's experiences in Juarez is that it takes 1 week usually). I would rather stay until the end of the week and leave on Friday but my husband and I are both going a little crazy sitting around doing nothing cooped up with the kids in a strange place for 3 weeks, and I feel like we're just holding onto false hope with an officer at the consulate tugging at our heartstrings with our future on his desk. We are so close that we can take a 5 min walk and see the buildings in the US on the other side of the border. 

 

 

 

 

 

Hi what lawyer did you use? I going Thur the same thing. Was denied 9/7/2017... try to see if I can hire a second lawyer because first one is any help... also is there anything you sent to the Congress people that helped or paper work you lawyer put together.. I’m also in Mexico in Apatzingán Michoacán.. a lot of crime and deaths lately here so try to see if I can get my case expedited... wish you the best luck if your i601 is approved your almost back home.. good luck 

[Jen Chem 6]

14 hours ago, Jtorres said:

Hi what lawyer did you use? I going Thur the same thing. Was denied 9/7/2017... try to see if I can hire a second lawyer because first one is any help... also is there anything you sent to the Congress people that helped or paper work you lawyer put together.. I’m also in Mexico in Apatzingán Michoacán.. a lot of crime and deaths lately here so try to see if I can get my case expedited... wish you the best luck if your i601 is approved your almost back home.. good luck 

Apatzingán has a good amount of crime- we included original and translated news articles from Apatzingán, Morelia, etc in our I-601 application (husband is from Zacapu). We also included medical reports indicating that my mental health (as the primary beneficiary) and our child's health were in danger, and made the very real case that it is impossible for me to continue my doctoral program without my husband's help. We put in all the evidence and documentation we could and read through all of their rules and regulations regarding what should be considered for a I-601 waiver due to undue hardship on me.

 

The congressperson can't help until after the I-601 is filed, but you can start trying to get in contact with them immediately. We had the great luck that my family knew someone that knew a retired congressman and they put us in touch with the current congressman. They send us a form to fill out with information regarding our case, and we had to submit a waiver to them so that they could get access to our case. 

 

Our first lawyer we found out was arrested earlier in the year for multiple counts of extortion... and on top of that we had moved to a different state earlier in the year so we went with someone else more local for the I-601. I recommend finding someone in the US that is local so you can stay in better contact. Make sure they're certified and not just a "notario". Let me know if you have more questions!

[Jtorres 2]

12 minutes ago, Jen Chem said:

Apatzingán has a good amount of crime- we included original and translated news articles from Apatzingán, Morelia, etc in our I-601 application (husband is from Zacapu). We also included medical reports indicating that my mental health (as the primary beneficiary) and our child's health were in danger, and made the very real case that it is impossible for me to continue my doctoral program without my husband's help. We put in all the evidence and documentation we could and read through all of their rules and regulations regarding what should be considered for a I-601 waiver due to undue hardship on me.

 

The congressperson can't help until after the I-601 is filed, but you can start trying to get in contact with them immediately. We had the great luck that my family knew someone that knew a retired congressman and they put us in touch with the current congressman. They send us a form to fill out with information regarding our case, and we had to submit a waiver to them so that they could get access to our case. 

 

Our first lawyer we found out was arrested earlier in the year for multiple counts of extortion... and on top of that we had moved to a different state earlier in the year so we went with someone else more local for the I-601. I recommend finding someone in the US that is local so you can stay in better contact. Make sure they're certified and not just a "notario". Let me know if you have more questions!

Thank you so much @Jen Chem  we also found out our back in 2010/2011 got his license taken away. We paid him in full and seen my appointment disappeared we call, Wife go to his office and he’s never there always on vacation meeting or court.. we contacted our congress person and want to submit expedited but not sure best bet to do with our current lawyer.. any suggestions or lawyer you used to summit the i601 expedited request? Thank you.... does the crimes happening in Apatzingán help get the expedited approved? 

[Jtorres 2]

2 hours ago, Jen Chem said:

Apatzingán has a good amount of crime- we included original and translated news articles from Apatzingán, Morelia, etc in our I-601 application (husband is from Zacapu). We also included medical reports indicating that my mental health (as the primary beneficiary) and our child's health were in danger, and made the very real case that it is impossible for me to continue my doctoral program without my husband's help. We put in all the evidence and documentation we could and read through all of their rules and regulations regarding what should be considered for a I-601 waiver due to undue hardship on me.

 

The congressperson can't help until after the I-601 is filed, but you can start trying to get in contact with them immediately. We had the great luck that my family knew someone that knew a retired congressman and they put us in touch with the current congressman. They send us a form to fill out with information regarding our case, and we had to submit a waiver to them so that they could get access to our case. 

 

Our first lawyer we found out was arrested earlier in the year for multiple counts of extortion... and on top of that we had moved to a different state earlier in the year so we went with someone else more local for the I-601. I recommend finding someone in the US that is local so you can stay in better contact. Make sure they're certified and not just a "notario". Let me know if you have more questions!

Did you get all the  articles from Facebook or is there a website you used? Thank you  

[BKII 2]

23 hours ago, Jen Chem said:

I'll go ahead and share our experience so far off the top of my head...

 

Early 2015 - Started the immigrant visa process for my husband. He entered illegally about 12 years ago and had been in the US ever since- we had to get the 601-A and I-130 forms approved.

March 2017 - 601-A and I-130 both approved; we started the D-260, I-864 etc. Everything was done by late June I think. They requested original W2's from the I-864 to bring to the interview.

September 2017 finally received our interview date in Ciudad Juarez!

November 14 2017 - medical and fingerprint appointments (I recommend doing them on different days- we almost missed the biometrics appt!)

November 15 2017 - Visa appointment - denied due to "alien smuggling" because he had paid to have his son brought over 10 years ago (the son was only in the US 2 years). We were shocked and hadn't expected a denial at all. He received the 10 year ban on admission. My husband left to live with his parents in Mexico and I temporarily quit my doctorate program to work on the I-601 and watch our 1 and 3 year old sons in the US.

December 29 2017 - USCIS received our I-601 pardon request. We got a member of congress involved as well and I highly recommend this. Through the congressional involvement we were told to submit an expedite request, which my lawyer took care of. 

February 9 2018 - Not only was the expedite request approved a little over 2 weeks after submission, but the I-601 was approved!! We were told by USCIS that we would be hearing from the US consulate in Juarez. (They approved on the 9th and we got the approval letter on the 15th I think)

March 8 2018 - I e-mail our lawyer asking if we can follow up since it's been a month. She calls in and come to find out they sent a letter a week prior to our old lawyer that we had used for the first 601-A. They send an e-mail this time. Several days letter we finally get the copy of the letter they sent us. It asks us to send in my husband's passport, and tells us that we have until March 9th to change the location where our documents/packet will be returned.

 

Here's the thing- we had the ACS in Juarez named as our courier location because that's where we were at his first time around. But the lawyer's assistant called in and made it seem like we were supposed to hand-deliver his passport and that we should be approved with that really soon, so we decided that the following week while I had Spring Break from classes that I would travel down to Mexico and then as a family we would go up to Juarez, turn in the passport, and wait a couple of days for them to approve the visa and send back the packet. My babies had been with their father in Mexico since the end of the year because there was no way for me to pay their daycare and continue my doctorate program without his income in the US. Unfortunately for us, the Monday we got there (March 19) was a national holiday, so we waited a day just to find out that we had to send in his passport via an approved DHL location. 

 

March 21 2018 - DHL says the consulate received the passport

March 23 2018 - Consulate receives the passport in their system

March 28 and 29 2018 - More Mexican holidays, meaning no one at the consulate was working

 

April 8 2018 - Today, a Sunday. It's been 2 weeks and 2 days since the consulate received the passport in their system but only 8 business days due to the holidays. We purchased plane tickets for early Tuesday afternoon and we're going to fly back to my husband's parent's house if we don't hear back by then. We've been calling daily but the hotline can't tell us anything other than that an officer at the consulate received the passport on the 23rd and that they have everything they need and that average wait time is 2 weeks (but from what I have seen online from other people's experiences in Juarez is that it takes 1 week usually). I would rather stay until the end of the week and leave on Friday but my husband and I are both going a little crazy sitting around doing nothing cooped up with the kids in a strange place for 3 weeks, and I feel like we're just holding onto false hope with an officer at the consulate tugging at our heartstrings with our future on his desk. We are so close that we can take a 5 min walk and see the buildings in the US on the other side of the border. 

 

 

 

 

 

hello

i hope you will hear agood news soon

i am thinking to try our  case expedited  same way you did ,could you supports me with lawer emal so i could ask him if it would work with us or not

do you think if we contact the same congressman he would help us ?!!

they have told us at the consulate  your case is good you just need to apply for the i601

any tip would be a great help

i601 was received in feb 8 2018

thanks

[Jen Chem 6]

2 hours ago, Jtorres said:

Did you get all the  articles from Facebook or is there a website you used? Thank you  

I used local and Mexican national news sites and international when I could find them (like BBC), and I tried to cover a variety of violent crimes, economic and political problems, etc, mostly recent within a month but some major stories that were more dated. 

[Jen Chem 6]

2 hours ago, BKII said:

hello

i hope you will hear agood news soon

i am thinking to try our  case expedited  same way you did ,could you supports me with lawer emal so i could ask him if it would work with us or not

do you think if we contact the same congressman he would help us ?!!

they have told us at the consulate  your case is good you just need to apply for the i601

any tip would be a great help

i601 was received in feb 8 2018

thanks

I suggest you find an immigration lawyer in Maryland to help you out. There really is no way of knowing if the expedite will work or not because it's very subjective and very difficult to get. You'll also need to figure out who your local representative is in the Baltimore area- congressional representatives are supposed to work for the people in their district so a representative across the country isn't likely to help someone not in his/her area. 

[Jen Chem 6]

5 hours ago, Jtorres said:

Thank you so much @Jen Chem  we also found out our back in 2010/2011 got his license taken away. We paid him in full and seen my appointment disappeared we call, Wife go to his office and he’s never there always on vacation meeting or court.. we contacted our congress person and want to submit expedited but not sure best bet to do with our current lawyer.. any suggestions or lawyer you used to summit the i601 expedited request? Thank you.... does the crimes happening in Apatzingán help get the expedited approved? 

I submitted all of our hardship info (including news articles) with the I-601. The lawyer only included a select few pieces of evidence with the expedite request but they seemed to have approved the expedite almost simultaneously with the I-601.