I-130: Is Beneficiary and Petitioner's Birth Certificate required?

[Fumihiko 0]

Hello, 

I am a US citizen filing a CR-1 spouse visa for my wife who is in Japan.  I am preparing to submit my i-130 packet to USCIS in the next few days.

 

While I was reading the instructions for the i-130 (OMB No. 1615-0012 Expires 07/31/2018), I wasn't able to find any instructions on attaching a birth certificate of the petitioner and beneficiary.  Looking at various forums on the internet, I saw many people including their birth certificates.  Are these people simply front loading their i-130 when they don't have to, or is the correct course of action to include the birth certificates?

Also, a general question, if your i-130 doesn't have adequate forms, does USCIS ask you for more information or just flat out reject you?

 

Thank you for your time.

 

[KULtoATL 1,551]

33 minutes ago, Fumihiko said:

Hello, 

I am a US citizen filing a CR-1 spouse visa for my wife who is in Japan.  I am preparing to submit my i-130 packet to USCIS in the next few days.

 

While I was reading the instructions for the i-130 (OMB No. 1615-0012 Expires 07/31/2018), I wasn't able to find any instructions on attaching a birth certificate of the petitioner and beneficiary.  Looking at various forums on the internet, I saw many people including their birth certificates.  Are these people simply front loading their i-130 when they don't have to, or is the correct course of action to include the birth certificates?

Also, a general question, if your i-130 doesn't have adequate forms, does USCIS ask you for more information or just flat out reject you?

 

Thank you for your time.

 

Birth certificates aren't really for frontloading. It's more to just support the statement of one's citizenship status wherever they might be from.

 

What do you mean by inadequate forms? Insufficient space for you to provide information asked or insufficient supporting documentation to support your petition?

 

If you have insufficient space after finished using the Part 9 Additional Information fields, you simply add extra sheets with petitioner name, beneficiary name and beneficiary A-number (if the beneficiary has one) at the top right corner then put in the page, part and item numbers and provide the relevant information.

 

If you submitted insufficient supporting documentation to support your petition, they'll either issue you a RFE or reject your case but it's more likely that they will do the former.

 

That's just some general information but if you'd clarify what you meant would be great in order for us to help answer your question

Edited June 17, 2017 by KULtoATL

[Fumihiko 0]

Hi, thank you for the quick answer and sorry for the lack of clarity here.

 

I am a naturalized US citizen so I will be sending a photocopy of my naturalization certificate and a photocopy of my passport, instead of a birth certificate.

 

My question was in regards to my spouse beneficiary's birth certificate.  On the i-130 instructions there is no mention of presenting the spouse beneficiary's birth certificate, but I was getting concerned because I was seeing many people on various forums including their spouse beneficiary's birth certificate in their i-130.

 

In regards to the general question of "inadequate forms," I was referring to inadvertently missing few forms or evidence to support my petition.  Glad to hear that USCIS might issue a Request for Evidence.  Thank you.

[truelove29 218]

You don't have to send your spouses birth certificate at this stage, but you will at the NVC stage, along with an English translation. I sent a copy of my spouses passport with the I-130, but it's not required. You should try to send your packet as complete as possible, but most likely if something is missing you'll get an RFE. Good luck

[Elrona 101]

I did not add beneficiary passport copy, as it was not needed. Will send our I-130 package out in couple of days and what we included. Will post the list here, as I found it extremely helpful to see what other people have added:

 

Form G-1145
Cover letter
Form I-130
Petitioner's passport photos
Petitioner’s passport copy 
Form I-130A
Beneficiary passport photos
Copy of Marriage Certificate
Evidence of a bonafide marriage
Timeline of relationship (we wrote down, when me met first, how we continued to communicate while we had long-distance relationship, when I visited him in USA, when he came to Estonia to visit my family, where we going to live together and what are plans for future)
Pictures (20 A4, altogether 30 pictures. Pictures of us two, us with other friends, him with my family, me with his family members. Have also included Facebook status updates/check-ins and our wedding pictures)
Chat history (12A4, altogether 28 screenshots: sending txt messages to each other in New Zealand and in USA, Facebook chats and showing calls/video chats via Messenger. Have added at least 2 screenshots for every month)
Copy of me being added to his USA bank account with my new name (I was very surprised I can be added to my husband’s bank account even when I don’t have SSN)
Copy of checkbook with our names
Copy of joint bank account in New Zealand

Copy of wedding congrats card from his father
Copy of lease for accommodation in New Zealand from June 2017 to October 2017 with our names on it
Hotel reservation when I visited him in January 2017.
Copies of flight tickets from my visit to USA, his visit to Estonia and joint travel from Estonia to USA and upcoming travel from USA to New Zealand. Stamps in passports, showing me entering to USA (2x) and him entering to Schengen visa zone (1x). Also stamps for our New Zealand travels.

[Fumihiko 0]

Thank you all for your help!!!! =)

[pushbrk 13,327]

On 6/17/2017 at 1:58 AM, Fumihiko said:

Hi, thank you for the quick answer and sorry for the lack of clarity here.

 

I am a naturalized US citizen so I will be sending a photocopy of my naturalization certificate and a photocopy of my passport, instead of a birth certificate.

 

My question was in regards to my spouse beneficiary's birth certificate.  On the i-130 instructions there is no mention of presenting the spouse beneficiary's birth certificate, but I was getting concerned because I was seeing many people on various forums including their spouse beneficiary's birth certificate in their i-130.

 

In regards to the general question of "inadequate forms," I was referring to inadvertently missing few forms or evidence to support my petition.  Glad to hear that USCIS might issue a Request for Evidence.  Thank you.

It's critical to read instructions carefully and interpret them literally, including words like "or".  Send a copy of your Naturalization Certificate, in color, even though the certificate says not to copy it.  That's evidence of US Citizenship.  The only reason you would also send ANY of your passport pages would be as evidence of time spent together in person in the beneficiary's country, or in the case of time spent together in a third country, the applicable pages from both passports.  Only if you lost your Naturalization Certificate, would a Naturalized Citizen send every page of their US passport as evidence of US Citizenship.  Keyword is "OR".

 

[DJWS 4]

We filed our I-130 last year and front loaded it with both our birth certificates with translations even if they aren't specifically asked.

We figured it was better to front load then risk an RFE(request for evidence) from USCIS which would further delay the long process.  (search RFE in visa journey and you'll hear delays)

 

My wife is a japanese citizen so we submitted both her "koseki shohon" and "koseki tohon", along with an english translation made by us, and a printout from the us japan embassy and state dept webpage explaining "koseki shohon or tohon" to any USCIS reviewer who might specifically look for a "birth or marriage certificate" and don't know that a japan "Koseki" serves as both a marriage and birth certificate in japan.

https://jp.usembassy.gov/u-s-citizen-services/local-resources-of-u-s-citizens/marriage/family-registry-system/

https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/fees/reciprocity-by-country/JA.html