July 2020 I-751 filers (merged)

[Christy&J 837]

14 hours ago, Aquilina said:

USCIS received my package on 07/09, I saw they took the $680 from my credit card today (07/14). It says Phoenix Lockbox but I sent the package in Texas 🤨 Now waiting on NOA...

I think there is where their piggy bank is. because my check cashed and said phoenix as well.

[notantifun 196]

10 hours ago, eoughphily said:

@notantifun we submitted ours on July 7th and was delivered to Pheonix Arizona lock box on July 9th.  Included G1145 enotification and G1450 cc payment.  Still waiting for notification and payment to be taken out.  

@eoughphily, my CC got charged $680 today but no notification yet. 

[DC909 105]

Hi guys. Hope you all are well. I dropped off my ROC packet yesterday  at USPS. Soonest I could submitted was July 13. 
 

I submitted the following in this order:

 

Cover Letter

Money Order

G-1145

I-751

Copy of Green Card

Marriage Certificate

Children’s Birth Certificates

Tax Transcripts from the past 3 years showing married filing jointly. 
Copy of Costco cards and printout of account details for the past 3 years showing both of us on the membership. 
Bank statements for our joint savings and checking account. 
Statements from my credit union where I have my car loan showing us in a joint account. 
Printout from E-Trade showing my wife as my beneficiary for my ESPP
Printout of my 401k plan showing my wife as my beneficiary.

Printout of my benefits summary for the past 3 years showing my wife as a dependent and as the beneficiary for my life insurance and AD&D insurance. 
Copies of our water bill showing both of us on the account.

Rental lease agreement and renewal addendum. 

Wish you all a fast and interview-free 10 year green card. 
 

[DILAW 94]

On 7/13/2020 at 11:40 AM, DILAW said:

I sent the package on Wed July 1st.  

 

Package was received on Mon July 6th 

 

Credit Card was charged today (minutes ago) on Mon July 13th

 

Still no text, no email notification even though I filled out the G1145 for e-Notification which has a cell phone # and an email address.

I got a text message at 2:00 am today Wed July 15th.  Just to inform me that the case has been received and that I will receive a notification in the mail

[Dachis 45]

I sent mine on july 6. Still nothing, no cc charge or text/email notification

[DILAW 94]

22 minutes ago, Dachis said:

I sent mine on july 6. Still nothing, no cc charge or text/email notification

Give them 10 days from the day they receive it

[DILAW 94]

21 hours ago, Todd and Ann said:

When we filed the I-129 or I-130 for our fiance or spouse, we filed a petition with supporting documentation and paid a fee.  If we did something stupid, like forgetting to sign the forms or not submitting payment, we didn't receive an RFE, we were outright rejected.  If we were missing a specific document or two, USCIS would not cancel our case and would send us an RFE to correct the file so we did not lose our application fees.  If all else failed, we had the privilege of starting over and to refile the application and pay the fees again.  This is not the case with an I-751.  We are up against a wall - a deadline.  If we fail to pass through the I-751 stage, our spouse goes back to their home country and we start the entire I-130 process over (again).  Not only do we lose the fees we paid, we lose their residency.  While the application and documentation for the I-751 are not as complicated as those we filed with the I-129 or I-130, the consequences of failure in this step are much more costly than losing a fee or losing 3-12 months together if we fail to pass the I-129 or I-130 process.  Do you really want to take a chance on not providing sufficient data to USCIS?  

 

For those who send some applications, they are making too many assumptions.  Many state "I already sent my marriage certificate in, why should I send it in again?".  Well, you are assuming that USCIS kept a copy of all your documents when you filed your I-129/I-130 and that USCIS still has those documents in their computer.  You are assuming that the person reviewing your case has access to those documents.  When USCIS sent our files over to the NVC at Department of State, did they keep a copy?  Do they have enough storage space and do they follow a specific statute of limitations on how long they retain documents?  USCIS is part of the Department of Homeland Security.  Our spouses were interviewed by the U.S. Department of State.  DHS and State each get independent funding.  They each have separate computer systems.  You are relying on a bunch of unknowns when you submit an application with assumptions that they already have documents because you submitted them before and that the person reviewing your case has access to those records.

 

Let's compare the 50-60 pages of "quality over quantity" documents this person submitted verses my 1000 pages (actually I rounded down).  Let's say we both fail to convince USCIS that our cases are valid.  We both will receive a notice from USCIS that they are preparing to deny our applications.  At this stage, since we both (likely) completed our applications without the assistance of an attorney, we will both find it extremely difficult to find an immigration attorney who will accept our case, since said attorney had no part in our initial filing.  If we are lucky enough to convince USCIS at this stage to hold off on a denial to give us more time, we are under an intense microscope at this point by USCIS.  This is specifically why we see recommendations from attorneys to use their services in the entire process, but we being cheap know-it-alls, we did it on our own.  Let's say we cannot convince USCIS to stop their denial of our case... they deny us both.  Now, we have to go before an immigration judge, facing a government paid USCIS attorney whose only job is to defend USCIS's decision in denying cases before the judge he/she probably goes to lunch with every day.  Again, we probably will find it very difficult to find an attorney to represent us at this stage because they did not participate when we filed the initial case.  Now here is the most important part.  A deportation hearing will be like an appellate court.  All the judge will do is to look at the application we submitted, listen to our testimony along with that of the USCIS lawyer, and make a decision.  They will not allow you to submit additional evidence at this time.  From the USCIS attorney point of view, the person who submitted "quality over quantity" has a very solid case.  There is very little wiggle room for the petitioner to defend themselves.  However, since I submitted such an enormous amount of documentation, I can say things such as look in the March 2019 Verizon bill I submitted (because I submitted all documents) and see where I pay for the phones of my step-sons and my wife and note that I spent 2 hours on the phone with her when I was out of town on business.  The USCIS officer who denied my case may not have noticed that (yes from the enormous amount of documents I submitted), but, I can point it out because it is evidence I already submitted, and, as I stated, this is an appeal not a time to submit additional evidence.  I have much more room to defend myself than the person who submitted a very specific set of documents.  They may have submitted just the credit card statement page (out of ten pages) that show the petitioner as an additional cardholder.  But, if that is not enough for USCIS, I can dig into the details of my statements in an appeal whereas the other person cannot because they just submitted skeleton supporting documents.  How does the individual submitting a low number of "quality" documents know for sure that the USCIS officer does not reconcile some credit card payment with the payment for the concert or trip you submitted pictures for?  We have no idea what they look for unless we have a spouse or relative who works for USCIS.  Even if we do, what one USCIS officer looks for does not necessarily equal what the officer reviewing our case is looking for.  Our officer may be very experienced and may be able to scan a Capital One credit card statement because they see them many times a day.  If we have a new agent, they may ask more questions.  

 

Because of the loss we are mitigating (deportation) by submitting a thorough application, submitting more is always better than submitted less.  We are not going to annoy the officers by submitting excessive documents.  If anything, we will give them ample reason to decide our case in our favor.

 

In summary, the risk is much too high to assume anything.  The risk is too high to judge what we consider "quality evidence" as being what USCIS considers quality evidence.  If we are denied, our spouses face a judge where they decide upon the evidence submitted and it is not a time to say "well you didn't see this..."  because that time is past when you reach this point in the process.  Don't make assumptions and don't assume you know what USCIS deems enough evidence to approve your case... unless you want to risk starting the process over entirely with your spouse in their home country.

You are using a scare tactic to justify your decisions.  You are saying all these scary unwanted words like "deport", "extremely hard to find an attorney", "denied and send back to their home country".  How many people you know went through deportation after their I-751 was denied?

 

First of all, the USCIS keeps a record of everything.  The USCIS officers are not stupid and when they want proof of a relationship, a marriage certificate (assuming you have provided it during the I-130/I-129 or even after getting married in the USA if entered on a fiance visa) doesn't proof a relationship.  I will give you an example, when you claim a child or a sibling under you, you don't provide that person's birth certificate because it doesn't proof you are responsible or supporting them.  

 

You can send all the documents you wish...hell, you can even include a McDonalds empty cup and say that you and your spouse drank from it.  You can include anything and no one is stopping you.  Overdoing something doesn't mean you are doing it well my friend, but good luck with everything

 

 

Edited July 15, 2020 by DILAW

[Todd and Ann 5]

8 minutes ago, DILAW said:

You are using a scare tactic to justify your decisions.  You are saying all these scary unwanted words like "deport", "extremely hard to find an attorney", "denied and send back to their home country".  How many people you know went through deportation after their I-751 was denied?

 

First of all, the USCIS keeps a record of everything.  The USCIS officers are not stupid and when they want proof of a relationship, a marriage certificate (assuming you have provided it during the I-130/I-129 or even after getting married in the USA if entered on a fiance visa) doesn't proof a relationship.  I will give you an example, when you claim a child or a sibling under you, you don't provide that person's birth certificate because it doesn't proof you are responsible or supporting them.  

 

You can send all the documents you wish...hell, you can even include a McDonalds empty cup and say that you and your spouse drank from it.  You can include anything and no one is stopping you.  Overdoing something doesn't mean you are doing it well my friend, but good luck with everything

 

 

Sometimes facts are scary.

[DILAW 94]

On 7/14/2020 at 2:36 AM, US <3 IND said:

 

Some personal advice for those still waiting to submit 🙂  I've been reading a lot of forums concerning what you should or shouldn't provide to USCIS. According to people who've had conversations with the staff who process these applications, it's much better to have fewer documents when possible. Quality should be the focus instead of quantity because more documents slows down the review process. Among other reasons, they have to scan an application multiple times across the different levels of review. 

In my personal opinion, making our applications easier for them to review is even more helpful in speeding up wait times, now that they are expected to suspend two thirds of the workforce due to budget shortcomings. That said it is up to each of us to decide how much we feel like we need to provide.

 

Try to focus on official documents with both your names included, and just include the first page of bills, bank statements, insurance statements, etc.

There is also no need to include every month, one is likely enough. And even if you are using it to establish address you can still skip months in between.

 

If you do have any children together, that makes your job really easy, as USCIS workers have told including their birth cert gets you about 70% of the way to proving your relationship. (Including my daughter's birth certificate my application only has around 40 pages of evidence )

 

If you feel your application still needs more strength after leases and joint financial documents, consider making wills, or power of attorneys, which can be done almost for free if you Google the legal formats in your state and then just pay to get them notarized. 

 

And as a last note, for proving travel, flight boarding passes are probably the best quality proof you can get in both your names. For pictures, clearly show both of you in recognizable places, or together with each other's family. Do remember though that this section is not as important as the financial and address ones.

 

None of this is legal advice, just good sense 🤗

 

Hope this helps more of you to come!

I agree with everything you said.  I have spoken to USCIS officers and sat down while they describe all the non-value-add documents they get.  I remember once asking an officer for the number of statements to send and the officer telling me "you don't need to send every one, just a sample maybe 1 every 6 months should be sufficient".  

 

I am all for quality over quantity.  But if some think having a 500+ page packages satisfy them and will make them sleep better, then go ahead I guess.  Oh, you are also correct about how having a child makes the case easy to approve.  I said it in another thread I think, but the officer I spoke to explained to me how having a child is almost all the proof they need to approve the case.  She also told me that if the couple age, background ( I think she really meant didn't specifically say this, but I think she meant religion, athnicity, etc) and other criterias are similar that it makes it hard.  

[theatxbombayguy 52]

4 minutes ago, Todd and Ann said:

Sometimes facts are scary.

These aren't facts, while I understand the assumption based scenarios and their ramifications - there aren't any hard facts on the variances, probabilities and actual numbers on VOs from USCIS on how they adjudicate these cases.
 

[DILAW 94]

17 minutes ago, Todd and Ann said:

Sometimes facts are scary.

Living life paronoid is scarier

 

You still haven't told us who you know went through deportation who are in a real marriage, but provided limited proof?  Who you know got deported because they didn't submit 24 statements of their credit card and didn't include 100 pictures along with their marriage certificate to proof they are living together?

 

You know what I think is exteremly difficult......the USCIS going to court to try to break a family (especially if there is a child involved) especially when the US Citizen spouse shows up and defends their relationship in court in front of a judge.  Bruce "Catylin" Jenner is reffered to as a "she" now and won Woman of the Year in 2015 because "she" feels that he is a female now......You want to tell me if a US Citizen spouse goes in front of a judge and says this is my spouse and we are in a relationship that they will be denied?  I don't think so

Edited July 15, 2020 by DILAW

[notantifun 196]

4 hours ago, Dachis said:

I sent mine on july 6. Still nothing, no cc charge or text/email notification

I sent mine on July 6 as well. It was received on July 9th. I haven't received any notification but my CC was just charged $680 today.

[eoughphily 21]

2 hours ago, notantifun said:

I sent mine on July 6 as well. It was received on July 9th. I haven't received any notification but my CC was just charged $680 today.

Still waiting for mine to get charged 🙄

[Aquilina 51]

Just received a text notification! (Potomac service center)

Package received by uscis: 07/09

Credit card charged: 07/14

Text notification: 07/16

 

Edited July 16, 2020 by Aquilina

[Ben & Katy 168]

I just dropped off my wife's ROC package at the post office in Tucson last night.  I was supposed to start on July 14th but decided to wait a day and a half so USCIS would not have an excuse to say I turned it in early.  Now the nearly 2 year wait begins!