RFE after embassy interview

[visacats 9]

Hi all, had my embassy interview today.

 

All fine, except annoyingly my police clearance from New Zealand (where I was born and lived before moving to the UK) had not been received by the London embassy, so my police records were not complete.

 

(This is a bit of an obscure process - basically, NZ does not issue criminal record documents for the purposes of visa processing direct to individuals. For US visas, the applicant sends a consent form to NZ Police with the visa application number, who then send it to the US Embassy in Auckland. From there, the US Embassy in Auckland is supposed to send it to NVC and/or the interviewing Embassy, in this case - London. I completed this process in January 2023 and NZ Police confirmed that it had been sent to Auckland, so clearly something has gone wrong in the chain. As a matter of policy, NZ Police do not release the vetting results to the individual concerned, so I can't play postman.)

 

So basically I have been refused pending receipt of the NZ visa vetting result.

 

The first interviewer who was checking my documents advised that he will request this from Auckland, and I have also found a contact e-mail address for IV visas at the Auckland embassy and chased them, so I am hoping that the information is sent to London promptly.

 

My question is, for anyone whom has had to provide extra documentation after the interview, how long might I expect it to take for the US Embassy to pick up the info and complete processing/issuing of my visa? 

 

It's not a huge issue as I am not looking to travel right away, but any experiences/insights welcome - it would have been nice to have had an approval today and it's a tease being so close to the end of the process!

 

Thanks.

[visacats 9]

Update on this - I managed to find e-mail or online form contacts for the Auckland consulate, NVC, and London embassy, and contacted all of them.

 

Auckland replied within a day advising that they had send the document to NVC on 9 January and that NVC confirmed receipt on 10 January.

 

NVC subsequently replied and advised they had passed the document to London on 23 February (so a couple of months prior to my interview, which was 18 April).

 

I haven't heard back from the London embassy, but through the course of today my appliation status in CEAC changed from Refused to Administrative Processing, and then to Issued - so all is well.

 

In case anyone comes across this in future - my advice if dealing with the NZ police vetting process would be to get confirmation from both the Auckland consulate and from NVC that the file has been sent on to the London embassy, as I believe that if I'd had that information with me (and the date) during my interview, I might have been able to help them find it on the day.

 

As it is, no harm done.