November 2014 Filers - Texas Service Center

[Wooderz 314]

Thanks, April, for the datapoint!

I just read somewhere that Congressmen don't really have any pull before the standard 5 month window (and granted I'm only at 2 1/2 months), but again... can't hurt for us to get them involved.

Correct. They can try to put in an inquiry I think but uscis will just say no not past normal processing times. Even then I'm not sure how much influence they have, but it can't hurt right? We have so little power at this stage of the process, anything we can do to try to help ourselves I think we should.

What you can do is make your representative aware of the discrepancy between CSC and TSC. That's a bigger problem than just our individual petitions.

I can't remember if this has been discussed in this thread or another, but just go ahead and provide your receipt number and send it the congressman's privacy form. It seems that people who do those things get better responses than those who don't. I sent my congressman and both senators an email before the holidays and never heard back from either. I'll probably resend the same email but fax over the privacy form at the same time soon and see if I can get a response.

[samita ben 1]

Excuse me , why the philippines are being expedited ??

[Unidentified 2,930]

Excuse me , why the philippines are being expedited ??

Because of a Typhoon a while back.

[samita ben 1]

can you explain more ?

[Wooderz 314]

In November 2013, a typhoon hit the Philipines. Uscis then issued an action notice outlining immigration relief efforts for those affected. One of the categories of visas that qualified was immediate family, which it seems they have classified the k1 as for this purpose. The relief was very clearly to be "upon request" but uscis started expediting every k1 from the Philipines then and haven't stopped yet. Rumor has it they will continue through the rest of this year.

This is a really touchy subject here. If it seems unfair and it upsets you, the best advice is to just ignore Philipines filers and stay away from any non-TSC specific monthly threads.

[samita ben 1]

Now i can see, thank you so much , i feel sad for the philippines and i hope so that everyone gets approvals

[KristinD 77]

Hey guys, I called USCIS today, just bc I'm annoyed and felt like it.

Actually spoke with a really sweet girl who told me TSC is for sure processing in 8 months and that unless you can find a reason to expidite the case you're just stuck (which I already knew.) Also tried to ask about the next transfer and she said she's in the dark too, till it's done. So essentially I accomplished nothing but talking ro someone there proved they actually exist! hahahaha I was kind of doubting people were at TSC, I'm picturing an empty building with files. grrrrrrrr

[stef_curls 42]

Hey Kristin,

I was actually thinking about calling too, thanks for letting us know! I haven't heard anything back from anything I sent out Monday... kind of not surprised.

8 months though... that's longer than any of the estimations this far. .

I've already cancelled trying to have any wedding celebration this year. We have too much to worry about and want to get settled asap since now it's going to be the end of the year again before hes here. It was heartbreaking going from thinking I would have someone to go to the beach with all summer and now we will are out to when the leaves will be changing.

I really hope they do a transfer.

[av8or1 246]

Hey guys, I called USCIS today, just bc I'm annoyed and felt like it.

Actually spoke with a really sweet girl who told me TSC is for sure processing in 8 months and that unless you can find a reason to expidite the case you're just stuck (which I already knew.) Also tried to ask about the next transfer and she said she's in the dark too, till it's done. So essentially I accomplished nothing but talking ro someone there proved they actually exist! hahahaha I was kind of doubting people were at TSC, I'm picturing an empty building with files. grrrrrrrr

Thanks Kristin,

Good info. I sent letters this week claiming (and complaining) that the TSC is up to 8 times slower than the CSC. I based that on some other data, so it's cool to see that my claims have even further substance.

I don't know that anything will come of those letters, but it sure felt good to send them. Somehow. I dunno. Just doing anything seems to help.

Anyway thanks again for calling and reporting back.

[Wooderz 314]

I heard someone else say uscis told them 8 months recently too. It's totally unacceptable.

I have mixed feelings about a transfer. Have you guys seen the thread about people who's cases were at CSC not being sent to nvc for months? Seemingly lost in the shuffle. I have a suspicion that CSC was told to hang onto them to let TSC petitions through, but this is just something I made up so could just be that CSC can crank approvals out but is totally incompetent forwarding them to nvc.

TSC doesn't have this problem. A lot of the ppl affected were the August transfers. They got approved in September and then it took 3 months or they're still waiting for nvc to receive their file. They really got screwed.

[av8or1 246]

Kristin,

I forgot to ask: did she happen to mention anything about why they're so much slower and whether or not they'll pick up the pace soon?

[KristinD 77]

Nothing was mentioned on why anything was slower, but here's my thoughts...I've sent every email to every person that I possibly can. I've tweeted, facebooked etc. With all the amazing people on here, maybe we should try to get something trending on Twitter. I have a meeting at 1:30, but I'll brainstorm on good hashtags and lets fill up @uscis's feed. If we can get everyone to post once a day it's better then nothing. (I'll try to track them to see what we get accomplished.)

[KristinD 77]

Nothing was mentioned on why anything was slower, but here's my thoughts...I've sent every email to every person that I possibly can. I've tweeted, facebooked etc. With all the amazing people on here, maybe we should try to get something trending on Twitter. I have a meeting at 1:30, but I'll brainstorm on good hashtags and lets fill up @uscis's feed. If we can get everyone to post once a day it's better then nothing. (I'll try to track them to see what we get accomplished.)

Here are ones to target:

@USCIS

@InouyeUSCIS (Press Sec.)

@uscisinfo

@uscisprocessing

@CitizenshipServ

Here are state related ones:

@USCISMediaFLA

@USCISMediaLA

@USCISMediaSF

@USCISMediaNYNJ

@USCISMediaVT

@USCISMediaBOS (This is for MA, NE, NH, RI, CT)

[TabeaK 517]

Geez, 8 months?! Don't wanna hear that, I want a December 2015 wedding and 8 months to NOA-2 is gonna make that very tight...

I am only 27d in, so won't be starting to call for a while - but I will certainly start making a ruckus THE DAY our petition hits 5 months.

Has anyone ever asked or got answers why the hell they are so slow? Just backlog? Not enough resources?

Okay, let me do some totally inaccurate math - I am of course aware the I-129Fs are not the only thing going on, but for arguments sake: The US grants around 30.000 K1 visa every year, so assuming there are 30.000 petitions every year and they get more or less equally shared between CSC and TSC. Makes 15.000 for TSC. If they are spread out more or less evenly over the months that would be 1250 per month. Now, lets assume an adjudicator spends 20mins on an easy petition (no previous marriage, low fraud country, complete documents etc) and 60mins on a difficult one (previous marriages, error in documents...). For the sake of the argument lets class 60% of petitions (750 per month) as easy and 40% (500 per month) as difficult. Assuming a workday of 8h or 480mins and an average of 21d per working month, that makes 10080 mins per month working potential. Now lets assume the average guy/gal only gets around 9000 mins to actually work on the petitions due to meetings or training or whatever.

Hence, I'd need 1.7 people to process all easy petitions of the month and 3.3 for all difficult ones. With 5 people working full time, give or take, I should be able to process all petitions in a month. And, those 1250 petitions per month correspond to $425000 in fee revenue paid by the applicants!

Of course, this type of calculation is BS without reliable data, but still...

These guys need some decent resource management!

Edited January 22, 2015 by TabeaK

[stef_curls 42]

I'm in. I'll make a twitree acct and find you and retweet everything. You have my number. Let's get organized. And maybe create a new thread to rally all the tsc'rs