NOT FAIR! California vs. Texas Service Center

[E-N 48]

I hope it is a speedy process for us all! Lets look at this way, as I told my fiancé last night at least this will be the last Thanksgiving and Christmas apart! Likewise for everyone!

[Marco&Bettina 502]

I second this.

We have chosen our partners for life. This is the person we have decided to face every one of life's adversities alongside. Sure it is hard to build a relationship when we are physically separated, but this is not wasted time, this is a proving ground for our partnerships.

In our relationship this is the second time my husband and I have lived distant to each other. Each of these separations has been difficult and frustrating but each has developed and strengthened our relationship. We are also less fearful of time spent apart which frees us to pursue personal career goals, knowing that our marriage can expand to allow two separate and equally important careers. Of course our marriage comes first, but we are more open to seizing life's opportunities as they arise.

It is easy to view the time only negatively, especially on the bad days, but that isn't the whole picture. My husband and I have grown in confidence as a couple because of adversity.

And I am speaking from over a year into our immigration process. Each process is different, it is better not to compare because we cannot know what other immigration difficulties a couple faces. Sure someone may get their NOA2 in 2 weeks, but they also might be at an embassy which routinely applies AP, or they may have grounds for inadmissibility. I agree that the differences in processing times are unfair. My best advice is to avoid reading the posts of people who are flying through the process unless you can congratulate them with an unburdened heart. On my bad days, I just don't read happy posts, ha ha!

Hang in there OP - the time will pass.

This is exactly what I did. I started ignoring CSC posts. I mean, I was happy for them but sad for me. And the way I dealt with that was just don't read those threads.

[YamenWaad 45]

I hope it is a speedy process for us all! Lets look at this way, as I told my fiancé last night at least this will be the last Thanksgiving and Christmas apart! Likewise for everyone!

you were right

but at the same time it's hard not to share them these occasions this year

[NEWLOVE13 21]

Hang in there but i do.understand your pain and you are intitles to feel how u want about it after all nobody knows how u feel but u but like everyone said just keep yourself busy get like two or three jobs if u have to lol?

[jamyestrella 8]

This is driving me nuts. Even worse is when people get approved at the TSC at a later date than I did. I called in early December to inquire about my case and complain about this very problem and I didn't get much of a decent response.

[Karo&Fer 10]

I want echo all the complaints about the Texas Service Center and although I am not one to envy California filers or those getting approval in a matter of days. I do believe it is particularly abusive on those filers waiting an extended period simply because of the region of the country where they are filing. We all fill out the same forms and pay equal amounts of monies but get very unequal treatment. I am not surprised about the disfunction becuase I expect it from any government agency but the particular discrepncy of this topic makes it uniquely egregious in its unequal distribution of services. One would think that an agency collecting hundreds of dollars to process an application would be able to streamline their methods but again I am speaking about the federal government and not IBM. That said, I personally feel frustrated by the entire process because I have been dating my girlfriend for two years. We have lived together in Colombia, we have traveled together to other countries, we have receipts, many pictures, and onviosuly a record of my travel and stays in Colombia. Neither of us have children, no criminal record and I meet the financial requirements. I sent a thick packet to INS, a friend mine actually believed it looked to well documented.

I know I am whining and feeling a common frustration among all of us who are waiting. But we are all citizens who have paid the same fees and sent the same forms but receiving completely unequal treatment. My suggestion, please voice your coplaints, hopefully a critical mass of voices will push for adjustments.

[ForgottenNotes 12]

the USCIS has quarterly customer engagement conferences/telephone conferences that we can join and voice our opinion and questions. I have joined the last 2 and they were very informative and took all questions from people on the phone call. I encourage everyone to join these conferences. They also have different topics for instance, online tools, processing times, workload etc.

[feeling_hopeful 45]

The service centers balance out - after seeing all the mistakes the CSC has done with shipping to NVC, I'd take the wait time of the TSC any day of the week. Read up on some threads, the TSC is taking a bit, but in the end, it's worth it.

[sma1488 155]

The service centers balance out - after seeing all the mistakes the CSC has done with shipping to NVC, I'd take the wait time of the TSC any day of the week. Read up on some threads, the TSC is taking a bit, but in the end, it's worth it.

I don't know if you're misinformed or just trying to relieve the stress of waiting by convincing yourself that TSC and CSC "balance out," but...no. Just no.

[rtor1 52]

I don't know if you're misinformed or just trying to relieve the stress of waiting by convincing yourself that TSC and CSC "balance out," but...no. Just no.

Well, he/she has a point when mentioned the balance out since CSC has been holding some cases and taking sometimes up to 4 months to send them to NVC. NVC is often backlogged. There are several posts about it and the majority of people are CSC fillers, so please, if possible, make some time to do a deeper research in regards to it. I always say that before putting any harsh conclusions here we should at least try to understand what's going on!

For instance: http://www.visajourney.com/forums/topic/528225-delay-on-getting-nvc-case-number-for-csc-filers/

Are you able to see people saying about 99 days DELAY? And yeah, the case mentioned was processed by CSC, that's why the person said it an be considered balanced out at times, of course there are exceptions but we have seen a lot of people with the same issue at CSC. It can happen at TSC as well? YES, it can. But we often see it happening at CSC.

[sma1488 155]

The 99-day delay that you cited is an extreme example and I was only able to find one person in the thread you linked to that had been waiting that long. (That specific case was also a transfer from TSC to CSC, making it even more atypical and increasing the chance of documents getting lost along the way and other problems occurring.) The CSC-to-NVC problem appears to be affecting a minority of petitioners, while virtually all of those at TSC except for expedites have been affected by longer than average processing times (now creeping over 6 months for many people). CSC is not perfect, but to suggest that it's worse than TSC (in the post I quoted the first time) is naive.

Either way, we don't have a say in the matter of which service center gets our petitions, so the debate is something of a moot point.

[rtor1 52]

The 99-day delay that you cited is an extreme example and I was only able to find one person in the thread you linked to that had been waiting that long. (That specific case was also a transfer from TSC to CSC, making it even more atypical and increasing the chance of documents getting lost along the way and other problems occurring.) The CSC-to-NVC problem appears to be affecting a minority of petitioners, while virtually all of those at TSC except for expedites have been affected by longer than average processing times (now creeping over 6 months for many people). CSC is not perfect, but to suggest that it's worse than TSC (in the post I quoted the first time) is naive.

Either way, we don't have a say in the matter of which service center gets our petitions, so the debate is something of a moot point.

As you mentioned you just focused on the thread I sent you as an example, again didn't go further to understand the issue, such as: http://www.visajourney.com/forums/topic/526167-i-129f-lost-in-between-transfer-from-csc-to-nvc-3-months-and-counting/

(ANOTHER ONE, different from the ''extreme'' example I gave you as you mentioned, you noticed they are different people with the same issue, right?).

But whats so ever, as you said its not a competition to see which service center provides the worst service tho.We all know how many things can go wrong We all free to have an opinion here and if you think (According to what you told him-her) the person who mentioned the balance out is stressed or not well informed it's your oppinion and dang, let me enjoy my NYE in my Copacabana apartment with my boo who came all the way to visit me!

Happy New Years guys and good luck to everybody in this long journey. I know later on we will all be with our loved ones!

[DerekYolande82 4]

I've been recommending Texas filers have their fiance get Filipino citizenship first, then bringing them to the states. It'll be much faster that way.

Just kidding. Sit back and relax for now. No one knows what's going on there right now.

haha now that's advice for yA lol ?

[Derek & Jenny 0]

My Petition is on its way to the USCIS in Texas. I live in California. Can I assume that the CSC will process my petition or will it depend on other factors?

[Wooderz 314]

My Petition is on its way to the USCIS in Texas. I live in California. Can I assume that the CSC will process my petition or will it depend on other factors?

Pretty safe assumption. Wouldn't matter too much anyway bc Phillipines.