Filling i-130, enter family name as Muller or Mueller?

[Zakalwe 0]

Hi everyone,

I'm currently filling out an i130 for my German spouse and am running into some trouble determining which spelling of her last name should go on the petition. Muller in Germany is written as 'Müller' with the umlaut(two dots) and there isn't any guideline or rule as to how this should translate into English, not from the government at least. Normally I would just use 'Muller', but she has been in the US 3 times, the first time on a J visa followed twice with ESTA and the spelling of her name on both the J visa and her ESTAs is 'Mueller'. The reason for this is not at all official. The application for the J visa was filed and accepted this way on the advice of whoever was running her exchange program at the time and was also accepted that way by whichever agency issued the visa.

The main problem with this is that our marriage certificate shows 'Muller', not 'Mueller' and I don't know if it's going to cause problems down the line if I use 'Muller' on her i-130. The only name on her official documentation including her German passport and government issued ID is 'Müller', there is no anglicized form of the spelling at all. So it's left to her or us to decide, and it seems that 'Muller' would make the most sense as it most closely matches her passport. However if we look up her i94, we have to enter 'Mueller' in order to get any results as that is what the government has on file.

If anyone has had this experience of having to change the spelling of their names, or if you know anyone who has had to deal with a similar predicament, please share your thoughts. I've talked to USCIS and the best they can tell me is to stick to whatever is shown on the passport.

Thank you

[Sparkle Sparkle 914]

I would leave it as Muller in the name field ...there is also another field that ask for name in native alphabet then you put in Müller' .....then use the additional information addendum to explain that she was once in the USA and the used the name Mueller . I believe you also asked to enter another name that you have used on the form too....the problem is I am not sure if you will need a change of name certificate of not because to my understanding it does not qualify as a change of name....good luck anyway and sorry if my answer left you more confused.

[kendelle 103]

4 hours ago, Zakalwe said:

Hi everyone,

I'm currently filling out an i130 for my German spouse and am running into some trouble determining which spelling of her last name should go on the petition. Muller in Germany is written as 'Müller' with the umlaut(two dots) and there isn't any guideline or rule as to how this should translate into English, not from the government at least. Normally I would just use 'Muller', but she has been in the US 3 times, the first time on a J visa followed twice with ESTA and the spelling of her name on both the J visa and her ESTAs is 'Mueller'. The reason for this is not at all official. The application for the J visa was filed and accepted this way on the advice of whoever was running her exchange program at the time and was also accepted that way by whichever agency issued the visa.

The main problem with this is that our marriage certificate shows 'Muller', not 'Mueller' and I don't know if it's going to cause problems down the line if I use 'Muller' on her i-130. The only name on her official documentation including her German passport and government issued ID is 'Müller', there is no anglicized form of the spelling at all. So it's left to her or us to decide, and it seems that 'Muller' would make the most sense as it most closely matches her passport. However if we look up her i94, we have to enter 'Mueller' in order to get any results as that is what the government has on file.

If anyone has had this experience of having to change the spelling of their names, or if you know anyone who has had to deal with a similar predicament, please share your thoughts. I've talked to USCIS and the best they can tell me is to stick to whatever is shown on the passport.

Thank you

I would keep Muller and  add Mueller in the field that says other name/alias used.

 

[Zakalwe 0]

13 hours ago, Sparkle Sparkle said:

I would leave it as Muller in the name field ...there is also another field that ask for name in native alphabet then you put in Müller' .....then use the additional information addendum to explain that she was once in the USA and the used the name Mueller . I believe you also asked to enter another name that you have used on the form too....the problem is I am not sure if you will need a change of name certificate of not because to my understanding it does not qualify as a change of name....good luck anyway and sorry if my answer left you more confused.

Thank you, I did put something in the additional info field and I'll upload her passport to the section you're talking about which is supposed to be for "languages that don't use latin characters".

12 hours ago, kendelle said:

I would keep Muller and  add Mueller in the field that says other name/alias used.

 

Thanks, do you think that will confuse them? My understanding is that this section is for if you ever used a different legal name, but I don't know...

[kendelle 103]

4 hours ago, Zakalwe said:

Thank you, I did put something in the additional info field and I'll upload her passport to the section you're talking about which is supposed to be for "languages that don't use latin characters".

Thanks, do you think that will confuse them? My understanding is that this section is for if you ever used a different legal name, but I don't know...

That should not be confusing

[Quarknase 1,072]

I would ask your spouse how they’d like the name to be spelled in English as it will appear that way on all documents, email addresses from future employers, etc. In German the official way to spell “ü” in absence of the actual umlaut is “ue”. At least all Germans will know how to pronounce Müller correctly when seeing Mueller. Muller would be pronounced differently.

I am German too and decided to go with the ue instead of u only, for the above reason. I too have documents (like marriage certificate, some visas for other countries etc) written with u only, but my official US IDs all have the ue.

[LilyJ 1,258]

However you choose to right it is how it will appear on the green card and SSN, and subsequently, other IDs. Either works. Write it however your spouse would like to have on her IDs. My husband has an ø in his name, and we chose to write it as oe instead of o as we felt oe is more accurate, and because oe is what he would prefer to show on his IDs. Then we wrote his name with the ø in the space where it asks for name in native alphabet. Everywhere else we used oe

Edited January 25, 2020 by LilyJ

[Zakalwe 0]

32 minutes ago, Quarknase said:

I would ask your spouse how they’d like the name to be spelled in English as it will appear that way on all documents, email addresses from future employers, etc. In German the official way to spell “ü” in absence of the actual umlaut is “ue”. At least all Germans will know how to pronounce Müller correctly when seeing Mueller. Muller would be pronounced differently.

I am German too and decided to go with the ue instead of u only, for the above reason. I too have documents (like marriage certificate, some visas for other countries etc) written with u only, but my official US IDs all have the ue.

 

24 minutes ago, LilyJ said:

However you choose to right it is how it will appear on the green card and SSN, and subsequently, other IDs. Either works. Write it however your spouse would like to have on her IDs. My husband has an ø in his name, and we chose to write it as oe instead of o as we felt oe is more accurate, and because oe is what he would prefer to show on his IDs. Then we wrote his name with the ø in the space where it asks for name in native alphabet. Everywhere else we used oe

Thank you guys! That clears it up. So really it's just personal preference then? It doesn't matter to either of us, we just don't want to cause problems or delays because of this fairly minor difference in spelling. 

[LilyJ 1,258]

Just now, Zakalwe said:

 

Thank you guys! That clears it up. So really it's just personal preference then? It doesn't matter to either of us, we just don't want to cause problems or delays because of this fairly minor difference in spelling. 

Yep pretty much just preference. No need to put the alternative Anglicization under "other names" either, that's just for previous legal names, just put down whichever you prefer whether u or ue and then put the name with the umlaut under the section made for native alphabet

[Zakalwe 0]

1 minute ago, LilyJ said:

Yep pretty much just preference. No need to put the alternative Anglicization under "other names" either, that's just for previous legal names, just put down whichever you prefer whether u or ue and then put the name with the umlaut under the section made for native alphabet

Are you sure? It says aliases as well. I think we'll go with ue just because everything is with ue other than the certificate. I can just leave an explanation for that in the additional information section I suppose.

[LilyJ 1,258]

5 minutes ago, Zakalwe said:

Are you sure? It says aliases as well. I think we'll go with ue just because everything is with ue other than the certificate. I can just leave an explanation for that in the additional information section I suppose.

Yes, it's not really much of an alias, just an alternate anglicization of her last name. We didn't put the alternate anglicization on ours, our petition was approved with no issues. If you feel the need you can explain under additional information as you said, but no need to put it under other names, that's just so they can run a background check if there is another name that you are known by or have been known by, ie a maiden name

Edited January 25, 2020 by LilyJ

[Zakalwe 0]

1 minute ago, LilyJ said:

Yes, it's not really much of an alias, just an alternate anglicization of her last name. We didn't put the alternate anglicization on ours, our petition was approved with no issues. If you feel the need you can explain under additional information as you said, but no need to put it under other names, that's just so they can run a background check if there is another name that you are known by or have been known by, ie a maiden name

Okay, thank you! Ue it is