Montreal embassy EB-2 interview wait time-Part 2

[ALC 61]

7 minutes ago, Texasbound1 said:

When are interview letters normally sent? Is it just towards the end of the month or are some also sent at the beginning of the month or other sporadic times?

July interviews were scheduled on 5/18, so I guess for August interviews would be end of June-ish. It's usually end of the month or beginning of the month, but Montreal has been a bit sporadical... 

[pilot787 23]

Just wanted to share my interview experience. Originally, was supposed to interview in Montreal, but switched to Paris embassy, because my husband is French, he is the main applicant. We had our interview in Paris on the 24th. The original documents we had to give in the first booth, the consular didn’t even look at any originals or police certificates. Asked my husband couple questions like, where does he work? If he is going to continue working in the same field. He didn’t ask me anything at all. After that he said that our visas were approved. When we got to the hotel, the CEAC status changed to Admin Processing. But we were not asked any additional documents, nor did we get and G221 form. When I did some digging, Administrative processing also means that the visa is approved, but not printed yet. Yesterday, May 31st the status finally changed to Issued. It was the same administrative processing for other people who interviewed with us the same day too. Just wanted to share that administrative processing does not always mean additional checks. And thanks to everyone for sharing their stories on this platform! It helped us a lot to get through this long process! We filed our I-140 Oct 2021. And hopefully today we will get passports back, which will be almost 1,5 years since we started working on this adventure! Good luck to everyone waiting for their interviews. I really hope that Montreal will speed up !!

[TheMaverick 50]

4 hours ago, pilot787 said:

Just wanted to share my interview experience. Originally, was supposed to interview in Montreal, but switched to Paris embassy, because my husband is French, he is the main applicant. We had our interview in Paris on the 24th. The original documents we had to give in the first booth, the consular didn’t even look at any originals or police certificates. Asked my husband couple questions like, where does he work? If he is going to continue working in the same field. He didn’t ask me anything at all. After that he said that our visas were approved. When we got to the hotel, the CEAC status changed to Admin Processing. But we were not asked any additional documents, nor did we get and G221 form. When I did some digging, Administrative processing also means that the visa is approved, but not printed yet. Yesterday, May 31st the status finally changed to Issued. It was the same administrative processing for other people who interviewed with us the same day too. Just wanted to share that administrative processing does not always mean additional checks. And thanks to everyone for sharing their stories on this platform! It helped us a lot to get through this long process! We filed our I-140 Oct 2021. And hopefully today we will get passports back, which will be almost 1,5 years since we started working on this adventure! Good luck to everyone waiting for their interviews. I really hope that Montreal will speed up !!

Thanks for sharing. Congratulations and all the best. Can you share your Montreal dq date and Paris dq date just to get an idea of how fast  Paris is compared to Montreal 

[pilot787 23]

16 minutes ago, TheMaverick said:

Thanks for sharing. Congratulations and all the best. Can you share your Montreal dq date and Paris dq date just to get an idea of how fast  Paris is compared to Montreal 

We DQ in Montreal September 21st 2022, I think. In the middle of December 2022 we asked NVC to switch to Paris, and we don’t live there, just have a passport. Our new DQ date was Jan 5th 2023 there. Interview letter we received March 28th for May 24th interview. But I think they do interviews in batches for EB2 nIW there, because there was another lady who had interview the same day with us, but she DQ in March. For her I was less than a month. 

[David San 11]

7 hours ago, pilot787 said:

Just wanted to share my interview experience. Originally, was supposed to interview in Montreal, but switched to Paris embassy, because my husband is French, he is the main applicant. We had our interview in Paris on the 24th. The original documents we had to give in the first booth, the consular didn’t even look at any originals or police certificates. Asked my husband couple questions like, where does he work? If he is going to continue working in the same field. He didn’t ask me anything at all. After that he said that our visas were approved. When we got to the hotel, the CEAC status changed to Admin Processing. But we were not asked any additional documents, nor did we get and G221 form. When I did some digging, Administrative processing also means that the visa is approved, but not printed yet. Yesterday, May 31st the status finally changed to Issued. It was the same administrative processing for other people who interviewed with us the same day too. Just wanted to share that administrative processing does not always mean additional checks. And thanks to everyone for sharing their stories on this platform! It helped us a lot to get through this long process! We filed our I-140 Oct 2021. And hopefully today we will get passports back, which will be almost 1,5 years since we started working on this adventure! Good luck to everyone waiting for their interviews. I really hope that Montreal will speed up !!

Congratulations and thanks for sharing your experience.

Just wondering what employment letter should contain? Is the employment letter should show that they need that individual to join them once they got the green card?

 

 

 

[topman 42]

Your lawyer should be able to provide you with the employment letter template. Here is an example that I had received. Hope this helps!

 

PRINT ON COMPANY LETTERHEAD

 

<DATE>

 

U.S. Consulate General Montreal

1134 Sainte-Catherine Street West
Montréal, Québec H3B 1H4

 

RE:     Employment Verification for <FULL NAME>

 

 

Dear Sir/Madam:

 

<FULL NAME> has been employed with our company since <DATE> on a full-time basis. We filed an Immigrant Petition for Alien Worker (Form I-140) on behalf of this individual and we continue to support the Form I-140 we filed. We are prepared to offer him a permanent, full-time position as a <TITLE>, earning an annual salary of at least <PAY> at the time this employee’s green card is issued. In this position, this employee will perform the following job duties:

 

• Add job responsibilities
• Add job responsibilities
• Add job responsibilities

 

If you have any questions regarding this person’s employment with our company, please contact me at [INSERT TELEPHONE NUMBER].

 

Sincerely,

 

 

 

 

[INSERT NAME OF AUTHORIZED AGENT]

[INSERT JOB TITLE]

 

 

[David San 11]

2 hours ago, topman said:

Your lawyer should be able to provide you with the employment letter template. Here is an example that I had received. Hope this helps!

 

PRINT ON COMPANY LETTERHEAD

 

<DATE>

 

U.S. Consulate General Montreal

1134 Sainte-Catherine Street West
Montréal, Québec H3B 1H4

 

RE:     Employment Verification for <FULL NAME>

 

 

Dear Sir/Madam:

 

<FULL NAME> has been employed with our company since <DATE> on a full-time basis. We filed an Immigrant Petition for Alien Worker (Form I-140) on behalf of this individual and we continue to support the Form I-140 we filed. We are prepared to offer him a permanent, full-time position as a <TITLE>, earning an annual salary of at least <PAY> at the time this employee’s green card is issued. In this position, this employee will perform the following job duties:

 

• Add job responsibilities
• Add job responsibilities
• Add job responsibilities

 

If you have any questions regarding this person’s employment with our company, please contact me at [INSERT TELEPHONE NUMBER].

 

Sincerely,

 

 

 

 

[INSERT NAME OF AUTHORIZED AGENT]

[INSERT JOB TITLE]

 

 

Is it mandatory to be working for that company at the time of interview. "<FULL NAME> has been employed with our company since <DATE> on a full-time basis.". ?

Edited June 1, 2023 by David San

[TheMaverick 50]

1 hour ago, David San said:

Is it mandatory to be working for that company at the time of interview. "<FULL NAME> has been employed with our company since <DATE> on a full-time basis.". ?

It’s not mandatory but in most of the employment based categories the person will be working with the same company either on H1/L1/TN. Also when petition is filed it’s for a job that the petitioner  intends to offer the beneficiary for a set role. So if you are not working for the same petitioner and if it’s been long from i140 approval to Interview date they need to verify that the job offer is still present. I am not sure if they also need client letters when working for a service based company but it’s good to carry the SOW or MSA to be safe

[David San 11]

12 minutes ago, TheMaverick said:

It’s not mandatory but in most of the employment based categories the person will be working with the same company either on H1/L1/TN. Also when petition is filed it’s for a job that the petitioner  intends to offer the beneficiary for a set role. So if you are not working for the same petitioner and if it’s been long from i140 approval to Interview date they need to verify that the job offer is still present. I am not sure if they also need client letters when working for a service based company but it’s good to carry the SOW or MSA to be safe

I have been working for a service based company for last 4 years. They placed me in different companies, but just recently I lost my job in last company that I was place for. Because there is a chance that they may reject my new TN application(As I am waiting for green card) I told them for time being I am going to work in Canada and once I got the green card I will continue working for them in US. So technically at the time of interview I will not be employed by them but later yes. Not sure if that will cause any issue.

[AgriSiva 12]

5 minutes ago, David San said:

I have been working for a service based company for last 4 years. They placed me in different companies, but just recently I lost my job in last company that I was place for. Because there is a chance that they may reject my new TN application(As I am waiting for green card) I told them for time being I am going to work in Canada and once I got the green card I will continue working for them in US. So technically at the time of interview I will not be employed by them but later yes. Not sure if that will cause any issue.

my understanding is that the employment is all about the future. As long as you can get a letter from your employer promising the employment in the future, that they will hire you for the same job that was identified and described on your I-140, then you are good to go.

[datafate 11]

34 minutes ago, AgriSiva said:

my understanding is that the employment is all about the future. As long as you can get a letter from your employer promising the employment in the future, that they will hire you for the same job that was identified and described on your I-140, then you are good to go.

This is certainly true. A friend of mine - had an unrelated question that  needed addressed and consulted with a Former Consular Officer in Argo Visa. They made it pretty clear the purpose of the interview is to check information provided as part of the petition  matches what the  Candidate is telling in the interview and of course to see if the applicant has any inadmissibility . They want to get a sense of, if the candidate is actually qualified to work on what they said they will work on for the company that petitioned for them.

 

This also aligned with what my company lawyer have told me in the past.

 

They key to Employment Based Petition is "Future Employment" so there is no requirement for you to already be working for the Company that is Petitioning for you.

 

 

[TheMaverick 50]

15 minutes ago, datafate said:

This is certainly true. A friend of mine - had an unrelated question that  needed addressed and consulted with a Former Consular Officer in Argo Visa. They made it pretty clear the purpose of the interview is to check information provided as part of the petition  matches what the  Candidate is telling in the interview and of course to see if the applicant has any inadmissibility . They want to get a sense of, if the candidate is actually qualified to work on what they said they will work on for the company that petitioned for them.

 

This also aligned with what my company lawyer have told me in the past.

 

They key to Employment Based Petition is "Future Employment" so there is no requirement for you to already be working for the Company that is Petitioning for you.

 

 

That is indeed correct. However timelines are very important.  For a person who is ROW it easy for future employment because time from labor to interview is relevantly short and so the petition job roles might still be true when still not working on that role. However for someone from India which is heavily backlogged where the petition was like for example 8 years back and if not working with that employer, questions arise as to why will that company want to hire you 8 years down the line. But nevertheless the interview is for future employment so as long as relevant paper work is good it should be ok. 

[3LabMom 76]

On 5/25/2023 at 11:49 AM, pilot787 said:

Did this status change to anything else at any point for you after the interview?

Never did.

[ALC 61]

Just checked my CEAC status, it says "Ready" now, with a last update on 5/30. So I suppose the case file is at MTL now. 

[Texasbound1 72]

Consulate website updated with no change to employment visas. I am not really sure how they calculate the dates since so many people have been receiving interview letters lately but the January 2021 date remained static for another month. Could it be due to Chinese and Indian applicants being retrogressed?

Edited June 5, 2023 by Texasbound1