RE: Delaying the Visa process while in progress

[JFox762 18]

My Fiance from the Philippines has been offered an opportunity to go to the UK to work at the UK headquarters for 9 months. Thing is, I've already submitted the K-1 Visa petition... and was just wondering how this would affect the process?

The work assignment will be for about 9 months,... If she is in the UK for work when she is finally aproved for her Visa interview... how would that work? Would she be able to simply go to the US embassy in the UK for the interview? Would She be able to file for an extension, and simply attend the interview when she gets back to the Philippines? Or to put simply... would we simply have to cancel the petition?

If we did cancel the petition, and tried again at a later date... would that make it much harder to be approved?

My Fiance has told me, that if this work travel opportunity jeopardizes our Fiance visa process.. then she will have to decline. We just want to know what our options are....

Edited March 17, 2016 by JFox762

[Shauneg 762]

The embassy in Philippines can extend the petition if you keep it active and stay in contact with them for up to another year (so it would be the 4 months and another 12....16 months total) before her interview. You can also contact USCIS to request the petition be sent to the UK, they will forward the request to UK and UK will have to approve the interview/visa process there. Visa is good from 6 months date of medical no matter what country it's completed in.

[cdneh 3,112]

If she has legal presence it the UK, she can interview there.

[Tahoma 2,291]

Continue your visa journey. It will take some months for the USCIS to approve your petition and for your petition to reach the embassy level. At that point, the embassy can renew your petition for up to one year. Your fiancée can interview in the UK or in Manila. When her visa is approved, it will be valid to use for six months from the date of her medical.

[JFox762 18]

I submitted the paperwork in mid February. She is expecting to be leaving for a 9 month business trip, in July at the latest. Will this screw anything up?

[Tahoma 2,291]

It's still doable even if she leaves in July. She will simply complete her medical and interview in the UK toward the end of the one-year validity peroid of your petition.

You should find out if the USCIS can forward your approved petition to the UK rather than to Manila. If they can't, then you'll have to notify the U.S. Embassy Manila that you want to transfer your petition to the UK. That could take a few months, and your petition's validity clock likely would still be ticking during that time.

[JFox762 18]

According to her... she states she likely won't be able to take any time off from work while in the UK to have her interview. Is it possible we can postpone this until she comes back from the UK?

Edited March 18, 2016 by JFox762

[Pennycat 880]

According to her... she states she likely won't be able to take any time off from work while in the UK to have her interview. Is it possible we can postpone this until she comes back from the UK?

She won't have a single day off for 9 months? That's..... odd. What part of the UK would she be in?

And.. guesstimating timeline here. You filed 4 weeks ago, current average from filing to NOA2 is 57 days (8 to NOA1 and 49 to NOA2). So you would probably get NOA2 mid-to-late April. Take a month or so to get through NVC to consulate. Another few weeks for consulate to contact you.....so you'd be looking to to medicals/interview in late May/Early June. Embassy can extend validity of petition for up to a year. So as long as she'd be back in Philippines by May 2017 it could work.

I don't know for sure though, you may wind up needing to scrap it and start over again. Could you visit her in UK (or in Philippines now), get married and go CR1? Easier, cheaper and saves you a lot of hassle once you're in the US. And if you're delaying her immigration here by a year or more, the wait time isn't a problem.

[baron555 934]

My Fiance from the Philippines has been offered an opportunity to go to the UK to work at the UK headquarters for 9 months. Thing is, I've already submitted the K-1 Visa petition... and was just wondering how this would affect the process?

The work assignment will be for about 9 months,... If she is in the UK for work when she is finally aproved for her Visa interview... how would that work? Would she be able to simply go to the US embassy in the UK for the interview?

The Manila Embassy would have to send the case to London. Yes, if she is legally living in the UK, she could go to the London US Embassy. You'd have to email both.

Would She be able to file for an extension, and simply attend the interview when she gets back to the Philippines? Or to put simply... would we simply have to cancel the petition?

Nothing to file for. The K-1 visa has a validity period of 6 months after her medical. In many instances, Embassies will extend the 6 month period. You'd inquire with the Embassy after the visa is issued.

If we did cancel the petition, and tried again at a later date... would that make it much harder to be approved?

No, but you'd have to go through the entire process (and time waiting) all over again. No need to cancel.

My Fiance has told me, that if this work travel opportunity jeopardizes our Fiance visa process.. then she will have to decline. We just want to know what our options are....

Your call.

[JFox762 18]

She won't have a single day off for 9 months? That's..... odd. What part of the UK would she be in?

And.. guesstimating timeline here. You filed 4 weeks ago, current average from filing to NOA2 is 57 days (8 to NOA1 and 49 to NOA2). So you would probably get NOA2 mid-to-late April. Take a month or so to get through NVC to consulate. Another few weeks for consulate to contact you.....so you'd be looking to to medicals/interview in late May/Early June. Embassy can extend validity of petition for up to a year. So as long as she'd be back in Philippines by May 2017 it could work.

I don't know for sure though, you may wind up needing to scrap it and start over again. Could you visit her in UK (or in Philippines now), get married and go CR1? Easier, cheaper and saves you a lot of hassle once you're in the US. And if you're delaying her immigration here by a year or more, the wait time isn't a problem.

I understand you think she will likely have our US interview before she is able to leave for the UK... but according to the timeline in your own forum signature... I could be expecting it to occur around September.

[Pennycat 880]

I understand you think she will likely have our US interview before she is able to leave for the UK... but according to the timeline in your own forum signature... I could be expecting it to occur around September.

I am speaking from both experience and knowledge of current processing times which you can find here. And yes, these are a much more accurate reflection than what USICS has on their site. I've been a member here for 18 months and I have been very deeply involved in issues with processing times. My timeline has zero reflection on yours. Things change with USCIS a LOT and you've got to go by current averages and trends and look at the people who applied a month or two before you, not someone who applied more than a year before you did, to a completely different (messed up) service center.

Explanation on why VJ is more accurate than USICS:

USCIS only lists their goal times, which in the case of I-129fs is 5 months. Then they report if they are within that goal time (if in, they say "5 months" as in "within 5 months") and if out of the goal time, give the date of the file they last worked on when the chart was published. They tell you as much in the "how to use this chart" portion of the page that has the processing times charts. But here at VJ, we track time with user-input data and have a much clearer and more accurate picture. And that picture is that you probably got your NOA1 around 8 days after you filed and that you will get your NOA2 around 40 days after NOA1.

Explanation of the long NOA2 waits you see here (including mine):

My timeline looks the way it did because when I filed, the petitions were going to one of two places: Texas Service Center or California Service Center. Texas was taking an average of 210 days on the day I filed. Huge backlog of petitions at Texas. So my 173 day approval was a godsend. California was taking an average of 21 days, with some people getting approved in as little as 4 days-- got the NOA2 email before NOA1 even arrived in the mail. No kidding. Through lots of work from TSCers right here at Visajourney (including guess who), USCIS eventaully changed it so that all petitions got routed to California which clearly has more staff because it's been about a year now and their average time has remained under 60 days ever since.

To estimate your own time:

Look at the Immigration Timelines and Stats.

Go into threads for December 2015/January and February 2016 filers. You'll see that this holds true, and you'll probably come in at or below the 60 day mark. Then, NVC takes about 2 weeks. And then most consulates take a few weeks to contact you and then most take under 2 months to interview, many much much less. Philippines 6 weeks from NVC received, as I said and as you can see here. So about 2 or 2.5 months from NOA2 to interview (you have to add NVC time to embassy received to interview time). putting you at a late May/early June interview as I said before.