HELP! How many joint bank accounts to have for ROC?

[Diamond507 10]

Hello everyone!

I am 1 year away from filing for ROC.

My USC husband and I currently have 2 checking accounts (one on my husband's name, one on my name) and 1 savings account (on my husband's name). We recently decided to add each other on all the bank accounts, so this way we will have 2 joint checking accounts and 1 joint saving account.

I am currently a stay-at-home wife, so my husband pays for everything (bills, rent, etc). His salary goes into his checking account and a small amount goes into the savings account. Next month I will start working. My question is, should we open a 3rd joint checking account and have both of our salaries go there, pay bills & rent from that account and have the rest of our salaries transferred to our other 2 checking accounts for personal use OR is it ok if we have just 2 joint checking accounts, his salary going into one and mine going into the other? Does it matter as long as all the bank accounts are joint?

Btw, we have lots of other evidence for ROC (joint rental lease, joint rental insurance, joint taxes, joint health insurance, joint dental insurance, joint life insurance, joint cell phone plan, etc.) but I am now freaked out about the bank account thing because I see so many people having RFEs for it. Even though our bank accounts haven't been joint since the beginning of our marriage, there were still a lot of transactions between the two, we often made purchases at the same time, same place, etc. So I will just highlight those on the bank statements. We also had each other listed as POD (Payable On Death) on our bank accounts. So I hope it's still not too late to have our bank accounts joined.

Thanks for answering my question!

[Diamond507 10]

No need to open yet another joint account since you now have 2 joint checking and 1 joint savings. What you could do is have both salaries deposited in an existing joint account. Same goes for the bills and rent. Don't freak out, your evidence is good and it wasn't too late. The POD on your accounts is a good thing to show as well. Good luck!

Thank you so much for your informative answer, Happy Chic. I will have my salary deposited into the checking account that used to be my husband's since the bills and the rent were always paid from that account before we joined our checking accounts.

And then after we pay the bills and the rent each month we transfer an amount to the checking account that was formerly mine so I have that amount of money for personal use. Do you think this would work?

I will also have a small amount from my salary deposited into the joint savings account as well, so we both contribute to that too.

Regarding our other ROC evidence, we will also include power of attorney and living will and some other things. Visajourney is such a great help

Edited July 6, 2016 by Diamond507

[Cheezees 1,514]

Thank you so much for your informative answer, Happy Chic. I will have my salary deposited into the checking account that used to be my husband's since the bills and the rent were always paid from that account before we joined our checking accounts.

And then after we pay the bills and the rent each month we transfer an amount to the checking account that was formerly mine so I have that amount of money for personal use. Do you think this would work? Would work for what exactly?

I will also have a small amount from my salary deposited into the joint savings account as well, so we both contribute to that too.

Regarding our other ROC evidence, we will also include power of attorney and living will and some other things. Visajourney is such a great help

[Diamond507 10]

Would work for what exactly?

I mean I know that sometimes USCIS asks for complete transaction history of the joint bank accounts. So I was wondering whether it would cause any issue that after paying the bills and rent from one account, we would transfer an amount of money to the other account each month. Maybe I am just overthinking this

Edited July 6, 2016 by Diamond507

[NikLR 13,232]

I dont understand why you need to transfer money to use for thing other than bills or rent. We have 1 joint checking account and 2 savings accounts. Money from both of our pay checks goes into the checking. We both use it to pay bills, mortgage, and buy everything we need or want. A percentage of our pay checks is automatically deposited into our savings for big items or unplanned expenses. But when we go out to eat or buy things, the money comes our of our joint checking. We just pay attention to what we spend. Theres zero need unless you have uncontrolled spending habits to move the money again into a spending account.

[Diamond507 10]

I dont understand why you need to transfer money to use for thing other than bills or rent. We have 1 joint checking account and 2 savings accounts. Money from both of our pay checks goes into the checking. We both use it to pay bills, mortgage, and buy everything we need or want. A percentage of our pay checks is automatically deposited into our savings for big items or unplanned expenses. But when we go out to eat or buy things, the money comes our of our joint checking. We just pay attention to what we spend. Theres zero need unless you have uncontrolled spending habits to move the money again into a spending account.

It comes down to preference, I guess. A lot of couples have 1 joint checking account that they use to pay bills, rent, etc. but at the same time also have 2 seperate checking accounts for personal use, gifts, etc...

Others have 2 seperate checking accounts and only 1 joint savings account.

My husband and I already had 2 checking accounts, now we put each other's name on it so both accounts became joint ones, and we will have our salaries going into the same one which we will also use to pay bills&rent. I don't see what's wrong with this...

Edited July 6, 2016 by Diamond507

[NikLR 13,232]

I didn't say there was anything wrong with it... I just don't understand the need to do it as such? But then some people have 10 credit cards and I only have 1 because I don't see the need to have more than that. Everyone is individual, and I prefer simplicity to complications.

life is complicated enough!

[Diamond507 10]

I didn't say there was anything wrong with it... I just don't understand the need to do it as such? But then some people have 10 credit cards and I only have 1 because I don't see the need to have more than that. Everyone is individual, and I prefer simplicity to complications.

life is complicated enough!

I understand what you mean. We have 0 credit cards for example.

From what I understand (and I hope I'm right), USCIS only cares about the fact that

1) the bank accounts are joint (we will have 3 of them - 2 joint checking and 1 joint savings)

2) and that there is transaction activity on them.

[Diamond507 10]

OP even though all your accounts are now joint in paper, I think psychologically you still want to treat one account as yours and the other as your spouse's. I may be wrong but that's the vibe I get. If that's the case, you could have still maintained one individual checking account if you value some independence in your financing. You just wouldn't have been able to use that individual account as evidence for ROC.

If you're going to continue with your 3 joint accounts, it doesn't matter if some things come out of one account and other things come out of the other. It's your accounts and your choice. Worse case scenario I can imagine is the IO who looks at all your accounts wonders why you have so many accounts...which is kind of the reactions you're getting here by others responding to your thread. Is that a bad thing? Not really. Is it unusual and a bit strange? Yes.

Happy Chic, you are right. But I understand how my idea could possibly backfire. So I guess the safest option is to follow the suggestion of NLR and have only 1 joint checking account and 1 joint savings account. Even though I am aware that it is possible to file for ROC without any joint bank accounts whatsoever and that we have plenty of other ROC evidence, I still don't want to deal with a possible RFE and the headache that comes with it.

Thank you both for your help, Happy Chic and NLR.

Since my questions have been answered, I now wish my thread to be closed. Thanks

Edited July 7, 2016 by Diamond507