DV VISA ISSUANCE DELAY WORRYING

[totobio 12]

15 hours ago, carmel34 said:

The US immigration process is always uncertain in terms of timing, so live your normal lives as best you can and wait, as hard as that is and frustrating, we are all dealing with it.  Most likely your visa approval at the interview happened just before the long holiday season at the end of the year so they are backlogged and it may take longer than 2 weeks so be patient and wait.  Congratulations on getting approved!  Try to put off any big financial commitments like sell a home or buy airline tickets until you have your passports back with visas in them.  Good luck with your transition to life in the USA!  What an adventure for you and your family!

Well I am most grateful to you for taking time of your busy schedule to share your thoughts on my concern. I appreciate the insight and the kind words. We cannot wait to enter arguably the greatest country in the world and start our lives all over again taking advantage of every opportunity the USA may offer us. Your advise is well noted and taken. We are praying that we get to hear something in the coming weeks. We can't wait to have our visas.

[totobio 12]

Well how about my status on CEAC showing READY with the last update been on 14th December 2018 for all 4 of us? That has been the only information on our case on CEAC. What does that mean? We were interviewed on 6th December 2018 in Accra. Our case was approved immediately.

[totobio 12]

MY INTERVIEW EXPERIENCE

1. Got info on 1NL around mid May 2018 from my wife as I was working out of Accra. I was selected! You have no idea what the feeling was, I just couldn't it and i was yearning to just come back to the city to celebrate and start gathering my documents. Got caught up in a few things along the way with documentation as I have already mentioned in earlier posts. I also had to cough up money for passports for all 4 of us as mine was the old non-biometric passport but none of my derivatives had ever held one. That was a hell of a ride as for some reason, passport books in Ghana were in short supply as I was told. I wanted and expedited service so I paid GHS 1,600 for all 4 of us(approx. $328)

 

For your information after submitting my DS-260 for all 4 of us, the CEAC website shutdown and after it was restored, I was unable to login again. I had some mistakes I needed to correct that freaked me the hell out, but @Frank Boakye saved the day with his information that I could make those changes at the consulate before the interview. I have still not been able to login to the CEAC site where the DS-260 was submitted up to date.

 

2. Received 2NL on 2nd November, 2018 and my interview date was 6th December 2018. Myself (Principal Applicant) and all 3 of my derivatives were listed on my 2NL. Our appointment was at 7:30a.m.

 

POLICE CLEARANCE CERTIFICATE

3. Went for our (Myself and Wife) clearance appointment on the 3rd week of November and we were given 3 days to come for it. However, it took me a week to get it as I later found out it was ready after 3 days but the officer who conducted the exercise had taken it and kept it for us.

 

MEDICAL APPOINTMENT

4. Went for our medical appointment at the Holy Trinity in the 3rd week of November, 2018. We paid almost GHS 7000 (approx. $1,434). 

 

BEFORE INTERVIEW DAY

5. I took two days off work to make sure I had everything in check for the interview. I used these two days to pray as well with the family. We were not sure of what to expect and everything else was new even though I had my first stint with the consulate in 2009 for a visa(don't remember what type as it was an invitation from a friend) that was denied even before I could utter a word. That made me think that the consulate perhaps reviews cases based on info submitted to help with decisions on interview days, well, that's me conjecturing...lol

 

INTERVIEW DAY

 

6. You bet we would not have  a full night's sleep huh. I had all our clothe ironed the day before, I told myself and my wife that, I am given this all I got just as I would do with a life changing job interview. I decided I was going to suit up and I wanted her to look her "formal" best as well as we are all formal sector employees so we were very much used to being formally dressed. As a matter of fact, I suit up 4 out of my 5 working days so it was normal but I also wanted to look my best for arguably he best interview ever in my life.

 

We left the house about 5 am and got to the consulate at 10 minutes to 6a.m. As most of you may already be aware, we parked outside the consulate and waited a bit for 7:30 to clock. I decided to snoop around a bit with others who were also there for their appointments to find out what to expect. I decided to walk into a photo booth to find out whether passport size pictures we have taken a few days back were accepted. Unfortunately I was told that the material the pictures were printed on were not the accepted one though the picture size was ok. We all had to come back to that photo booth and take new pictures, that cost us GHS 80.

Our inventory for the interview included the following:

 

All birth certificates and photocopies

All academic certificates and photocopies( I had SSCE certificate and it was laminated)

Sealed Medicals Envelopes for all 4 of us.

2 Police Clearance Certificates (Me and my wife only)

Marriage Certificate and 2 photocopies.

DS-260 Confirmation Pages for all 4 of us.

2NL

Passports

$1,300 for visa fees (I couldn't get $20 change so I had GHS 100 on me, that caused some drama though as u will find out later)

2 Passport pictures each (American size)

4 Photo Albums (One for my first daughter, one for pictures before we married in 2012, one for wedding pictures, one for engagement pictures)

We also took along "prayer"

 

At about 7:45am, I moved towards the unofficial waiting place under the tree adjacent the consular section gate of the consulate. In 5 minutes we were all called in to follow a queue where our 2NL and passports were inspected by a young man who had some sort of an appointment list. Our appointment was confirmed and we moved a head to a security man who checked our 2NL and passports again. We were not allowed to send our bags and any electronic devices including cell phones, so we left that with the Police Officer's post in front of the gate. We were further ushered in to a second area where we were checked for possession of any electronic device or any offensive item. 

 

Within the consular section of the consulate, all immigrant visa applicants were asked to sit at one place, we were about 35 people. We were asked to go to a window for briefing after 10 minutes. At the window, a friendly looking ma of about 40 spoke to us about the DV applicants and the process and documents required prior to our interview. The first was to pay the visa fees, then go for inspection and collection of documents at one of the windows and then the final interview.

 

My attempt to pay our visa fees was met with a rejection by the Cashier as I was told the consulate does not accept cash payments in different currencies(Please refer to my cash at hand above). I was also told that once you enter the embassy you cannot go out. However, I remember at the first window for the briefing I was the only one that was bold enough to ask a couple of questions, that sort of made me the go to person when others wanted some clarity after the briefing. Leveraging on that, I decided to go back to the man who gave us the briefing to talk to him about my case and he obliged with a note for me to return by 9a.m., it was 825a.m. when I left the consulate in my quest to get a change for $20.

 

I dashed out with such speed and breath some of the security officers thought I was been chased out, lol. I asked a few people around and I was told I needed to go to Labone, about 10 minutes drive from the consulate. I chanced on a forex bureau after about 5 mins drive only to be told by the attendant that he could only get $50. I desperately looked around and found an ATM as I had my wallet and bank cards on me. I withdrew an additional GHS 150 to add to my GHS 100(exchange rate on the day was GHS 5 to $5). I now had a total of $1,350 dollars as opposed to the exact fee of $13,20. I quickly dashed back to the consulate, showed my note to them and they allowed me in. I was asked to join the queue again to make payment to the cashier, all this while my wife and kids were in the consulate. My kids were having play time with our passport pics and photo albums and making noise all over the place. I made payment and got $30 change.

 

In about 5 minutes, we were called to submit our documents at window 13. We got there and a very calm looking lady also Ghanaian I believe requested for my documents first in a particular order(Passport, Birth Cert, Educational Certs, Police report, DS-260 confirmation page, Marriage Cert, 2 Passports size pics), all documents were received as original and photocopy. It was at this point that I told the woman about the mistakes i had made on the DS-260 for my wife and younger daughter and she obliged to make the changes for me (Thanks @Frank Boakye ). 

We submitted all documents in the format as described above except there was no marriage certs, educational certs and police reports for the kids. My wife's educational certificates were not taken either. Our albums were huge so she asked us to open them up and slide them into the open space on the ledge on her window so we could get them in on the other side of the window to her. All set, we were asked to wait for our interview.

 

I moved into the washroom to kill a bit of the pressure and nerves, came back to sit and my wife followed with a visit to the washroom as well. Within 2 minutes we were called to window 3 for our interview and all of us went to the window.

 

THE INTERVIEW:

Me and wife: Goodmorning

CO: Goodmorning

Co: Adults, please raise up your hands and take your oaths.

Me and Wife: Raised our hands and took the oath.

CO: Where is your mother, asked my first daughter who was hanging on her moms shoulder.

Daughter: Pointed to her mom.

CO: Have you guys been married before?

Me and Wife: In unison, NO

CO: Have you guys been divorced before?

Me and Wife: In unison, NO

CO: Do you guys have any kids apart from these kids?

Me and Wife: In unison, NO

CO: What is your highest educational qualification? To Principal Applicant, ME.

Me: Blah blah blah... original certificate was right in front of him, he looked at it and looked back at me and our eyes crossed.

CO: Where do you wanna stay in the U.S.?

Me: Blah Blah Blah.

CO: Are you serious? You don't mean it right? 

Me: That's is the address I would be staying.

CO: Wait a minute, CO whips up his phone from his desk, types something and shows me a road map? Do you see that?

Me: Stunned and confused at this stage, just looking and saying no.

CO: Oh you don't get it right?

Me: Yes.

CO: Well that is a very populated city with lots of immigrants and its expensive too.

Me: Well, that is where I am going now because I have someone there whom I trust and can support me and the family hosting us for a few months before we integrate.

 

At this stage, another CO comes to our window to pull our CO away. CO politely excuses us. Comes back after a minute and a half.

 

CO: Starts giving us our original documents back and ask. How did you guys submit these albums in here?

Me: Told CO how we sent it via the open space by opening it first.

CO: Well, am not going to look at your albums so yu guys have it back. CO opens to push through the space, sees me and wife kissing in one of our pictures and exclaims...OOOOO.

Me and Wifey: LOL

CO: pushes all our albums to us and ask wheteher we have been married before, whether we had kids anywhere and whether we have been divorced before.

Me and Wife: In unison, NO.

CO: Do you want to go to America? Ask my first daughter again.

Daughter: Answer with a positive response with a head gesture, gets her chin hitting the ledge as she was standing now and could only manage a height up to the level of the ledge.

CO: Exclaims again....

CO: I believe you guys are truly married and these are your only kids... I am going to APPROVE your visa. You guys prepared very well for your interview. Welcome to America! You would have your visas within 2 weeks but please do not make any travelling plans or sell your property or quit your job until you have your visas and passports back. CO hands us a sheet with instructions on how to Collect your Visa.

 

CO kept photocopies of all our documents, Medicals, Police Certs and all our passports. You have no idea the kind of excitement that followed us all the way through. We are yet to hear from the Consulate after our interview on December 6, 2018. Our checks on CEAC after the data was uploaded shows READY, last date of update is December 14th, 2018 for all 4 of us.

 

Thank you.

 

[totobio 12]

Hi everyone, this is just a quick update on my case. My case is still stuck on READY and it's been more than half a year since my interview, in fact, June 7 would be exactly 7 months since I was interviewed (My interview experience above). There has been only 2 updates since my interview, all were just date updates. My passport and that of my family are still with the consulate. They have been absolutely no feedback or whatsoever from the consulate. My mails to ustraveldocs have always received feedback that suggest that they do not have any information on my case, I should be patient and wait.

 

Now my question is, with all regions going current in the July VB, what could be the probable impact on my case? If there was anything gravely wrong with my application why haven't they gotten back to me or even  right away deny my application? What have been the most likely outcomes of cases like mine considering where I come from? I believe any relevant checks on my case should have been completed by now. I have never traveled outside the country, I have no links or ties to any organization or individual with any extremist ties or whatsoever. This has become ridiculously unbelievable to believe.

 

If anyone has any input on any of the questions I have raised above, I would appreciate them Thanks