Our "Red Flag" AOS interview experience.

[qwertop22 1]

I have decided to share my AOS experience in hope it will help someone to prepare for interview and maybe make

someones experience smoother.

Our case could be considered as a Red Flag case, just because it is not a regular, "same as before" case.

So here is Our story:

I have arrived using Student visa more than seven years ago and overstayed it. Being doing different jobs, but

never employed, paid taxes, had SSN and Drivers license (I got them when I still had a VISA).

Few years ago I have met my wife. She was from same country as I'm , and she got her GC and US citizenship through

marriage to US Citizen and was going through divorce. Her ex-husband had drinking problem and filed for divorce

when he got in Prison.

We ware dating for about 6 month and than I proposed her. We moved in together and got married. I have not filled

for AOS immediately , since I had to gather all document needed.

So finally we filled everything , and start preparing for the worth. We did understand it will be not easy,

considering our story, but we ware confident in our relationship,and we thought, even if they reject us and will

have our case declined, we will fight until we can or until we run out of money for Attorneys. So we decided not

to hire a Lawyer until we run into some kind of problem, since most of them just ask for $1000-$3000 just to fill

your papers, talk to you about what happens next, and than send someone to stand behind you during the interview we

decided to save this money in case we will need "real" help.

Since we have not filled immediately after marriage, we had enough evidences to send with our case, not just bills

and pictures, but bunch of Bank statements, showing transactions during our vacations, we also saved all evidences

of every place we have visited including things like Zoo tickets or National Park Maps. We also had paperwork for

our Car loan and joint ownership of Real Estate.

One month before the interview, we started our preparation, gathered everything, checked multiple times, packed in

a folders, got photo albums printed for the whole period of our relationship. We did ask each other questions all

the time. We gather all the questions from this website, print them and then answer in writing, each sitting in

different room, we made out calendar for last week before interview and wrote everything we did every day . We

ware prepared for any kind of questions in any circumstances , including separate interview in different rooms,

under pressure.

But sometimes we still manage to answer some questions differently, like for example I can say the floor is

laminate and my wife's answer was hardwood .

So Interview day:

We got up in a morning, had a breakfast and head to the Downtown office, park a car , went through security ,

checked in and begin to wait for our turn. We had 4 couples in front of us .

Those who ware leaving looked happy, but one couple has being separated, and husband had to wait in a hallway

burning Nerve Cells.

We ware called just 5 minutes after our appointment time .

Officer askes standard Yes\No questions, than how we met and what we do. than She ask me if I still have my I-94

and I gave it to her. She saw our one foot tall folder and said , she do not need anythig, and if we just can show

her our wedding photo album. We did give it to her and she made few comments, but did not ask us anything, and then

she told us : I will approve you case !!! and we ware like....what??? that is it? Wow... But we just smile , and

thank her.

So my tip : Be confident, Be prepared, Have all possible evidences, send them as much as you can, bring even more

to the interview, Don't be scared, Be yourself...

[R2B 2]

congratulations! thanks for sharing

[TBoneTX 45,288]

*** Thread moved from "AOS from WS&T Visas" main forum to the Case Progress subforum. ***

[samo2016 3]

I was wondering why do you think your case was "red flaged"

[Emilythorne 0]

Why Red flag? There's no such thing as "red flag" if the relationship and marriage is genuine. Congrats!