Has anyone done DCF at UK USCIS from outside UK (in UK jurisdiction) with "exceptional circumstances"?

[pyridine 12]

I'm not at the stage of actually trying this yet, but I'm a US citizen living abroad in Denmark and married to a Hungarian citizen, and I'm trying to plan for how to sponsor my husband for immigration should I get a job offer that brings me back to the US (we wish to move there in the rather near future). 

 

Denmark does not have DCF, and we are assigned to the London USCIS office, which will only allow DCF in their jurisdiction if there are "exceptional circumstances". I had previously found this memo from that office stating that "Short notice of position relocation: A U.S. Citizen petitioner, living and working abroad, who receives a job relocation within the same company or subsidiary to the United States, or an offer of a new job in the United States with very little notice" is an exceptional circumstance:

 

https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/USCIS/Laws/Memoranda/2012/May/DOS-I130May1412.pdf

 

In my case I would only go back if I had a waiting new job offer in the US or if we carefully planned ahead to leave regardless of employment within 1 year in the future, then I suppose we can still apply in advance and continue living here until the visa is granted? 

 

I find this all a bit insane to contemplate, as we are getting quite old and have been trying for years to have a child.  Should that finally happen, it seems like a really undue burden that only one of us can take the theoretical child for 1+ year and have to care for it alone (as though it's not bad enough being totally apart from any remaining members of our small families that could help!).

 

Has anyone tried this before?  Would appreciate any input of whether this could fly with DCF and avoid the dreaded Chicago lockbox. Almost seems easier to try to get residency in a DCF country first...

 

Edited September 30, 2017 by pyridine

[mexicoAmigo 3]

Hi pyridine,

This is exactly what I did. I'm a US citizen living in Mexico and my company was transferring me back although I had no official start date. I wanted to start the process because I wasn't sure how long the whole thing would take and wanted to be ahead of the curve for when they relocated me. I got a letter from my company saying that at some point I'd be transferred back (though with no date), and to please expedite the case so my wife and I would be apart for as little time as possible. We just added the letter to the top of the stack of all the documents, and filed together in person in Mexico City.

 

It worked! They expedited our case and it was less than three months turnaround from filing to visa approval. In speaking with some officers there, they actually said the hardest part is not to show proof of expedition or bona fide marriage, but that the US citizen truly lives abroad (longer than six months) and therefore qualifies for DCF and "skipping the line". This was easy for me as I have a temporary resident Mexico ID card plus all my job pay stubs here in Mexico.

 

That being said, through this forum I found other people in my situation who didn't need expedition but just simply qualified for DCF because they were bona fide US citizens abroad. They filed DCF and had similar timelines as mine, about three months, without any justification for expedition.

 

Hope this helps. 

[mexicoAmigo 3]

About the residency piece, it's not a bad idea to try for residency in a DCF country. I imagine all countries are different but the proof of residency doesn't necessarily need to be super official. I've heard of house rental contracts and bill statements being good enough for the residency piece. When we were filing I saw some other folks trying to file and they were turned away because they had literally NOTHING showing they were actually living in Mexico and it was obvious they were wanting to see if they could apply for DCF.

 

You could just call the consulates in whatever country you want to become a resident in and ask what qualifies as a residency requirement. I did that here in Mexico prior to starting the process and it wasn't that obvious from the website, I just walked into the embassy one day and asked and they gave me a sheet of paper with all the requirements for DCF and what constituted residency.

[pyridine 12]

Hi mexicoAmigo,

 

Thanks for your response. Does Mexico have a USCIS office? My main problem is we don't normally have DCF at all in Denmark (I've been a resident here over 5 years, my proof of that is no issue whatsoever) and the UK office whose jurisdiction we are in only offers DCF to us in so-called exceptional circumstances. Fortunately I found the outline of what normally constitutes that, and a job transfer or new job offer is supposed to ordinarily fit the bill, but I'm still incredibly nervous if that would even fly, as it's a memo from 2012. I have a phone interview with a US company on Friday and not even sure what to tell them about my availability. As a 38 year old woman trying to start a family for years, I'm not willing to be separated from my spouse for several months.

 

So it's not technically an expedite although maybe I could also request that? And it still took 3 months for you with expedited DCF -- then is this regular DCF, if I could even get that, much slower? Or is this expediting you refer to just the regular DCF? I've been looking for timelines for just that, in case I could get it approved through the UK office.

 

I guess since it takes 6 months residency to file DCF, that route would be a bit silly since we'd need to find jobs and move to have residency which is more than a small hassle, was just kind of pontificating. This DCF thing is now incredibly unfair for those of us not living in a DCF country.

 

Sorry if this is a little incoherent, written on my phone!