top_secret

Well our rent is kind of by gentlemen's agreement and a handshake with the owner and has been that way for years. The owner is charging us fairly substantially under market rent and throws in utilities to, but he doesn't like being bothered so I'm not going to bother the guy about some paperwork we never needed before and if anything ever needs fixed on the place, I just fix it myself. I do however totally get it that it is less than ideal on this petition. I like living dangerously. 😉 I figure if I can book a last minute plane ticket from some sketchy travel agent in north Jakarta without triggering a fraud alert, my bank has apparently finally come to terms with my spending profile. Thank You

Well since we will be mailing our packet tomorrow I guess it's time to start a September 2023 thread. Our 90 day window started the last week of July but we were out of the country last month so we put it off until we got back to avoid any surprise biometric appointments or missed notices. It looks like we will be sending in.... G-1450 credit card authorization. G-1145 E-notification. I-751 of course. Copies of their green cards, front and back, and passports. Copies of California Real ID Driver Licenses for my wife and I plus California Real ID card for my stepdaughter all at the same address. IRS tax return transcripts of our 2022, 2021, and 2020 joint US tax returns. Statements from our joint checking account showing joint ownership of the account and direct deposits of both of our salaries plus payments of bills in each other’s names. However only the last 5 months. Prior to that we had separate accounts and just shared expenses. Dated photographs of our family together in numerous places at intervals throughout our time together in the US, plus photos of my almost 80-year-old American mom meeting her Filipino in-laws on vacation in Manila. Copy of a California car title showing joint ownership and two years joint car registration. Copies of various car insurance notices and proof of insurance listing both drivers, covering almost the entire period they have been in the US. Copies of both of our 401K’s beneficiaries with each listing the other spouse as beneficiary. Copies of our Visa, Mastercard and Discover credit cards showing joint accounts. Copies of various club cards and membership cards showing joint accounts. Copies of various airline boarding passes and receipts for vacations we took together. Copies of my stepdaughter's continuous registration from our address in our neighborhood’s public elementary school for 3rd, 4th and 5th grade. The school registration lists both of us as emergency contacts with full authorization to pick her up from school. Copy of my stepdaughter's California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress test results showing two years results with her living at our address and enrolled in our neighborhood public elementary school. Paystubs for my wife periodically throughout her time in the US showing her continuous presence at our home address. We’ll be double triple checking everything this evening and probably send it by Priority Mail flat rate mailer ("if it fits, it ships") to Phoenix drop box in the morning. I'm hopeful that is good enough, however notable deficiencies would include not having any joint lease or other paperwork associating both names with the house. All of our health insurance is separate since my wife and I each get it from our employer and neither plan is any good for adding the step-daughter so we just pay her insurance separately out of pocket. No kind of joint utility bills or anything like that and as I mentioned only the last 5 months have we had a joint checking account. I also didn't bother to get any affidavits from anyone. I guess we will find out if it was good enough in like 2025 or something.

I believe the question referred to is It would seem the first situation applies. She WAS refused a B2 visa so the answer is YES. When it asks explanation, it is just what you said. The B2 denial has no impact whatsoever on the spousal visa but they do know all about it and why. So you have to put it there when asked. My wife had two previous B2 denials. We answered yes and listed them there and it was not the slightest issue.

PSA is merely the record keepers. PSA doesn't create any civil documents, they merely maintain official copies of documents created by the LCRO or in the case of a ROM, they keep an official copy of the document created by the overseas consulate. I often hear Filipinos referring to a PSA ROM as a "PSA Marriage Certificate". In the Philippines it is more or less the legal equivalent. But outside of the Philippines and for US immigration purposes it has no legal significance whatsoever. It's definitely not considered a "marriage certificate" in the eyes of USCIS, NVC or the US Embassy.

I know of quite a few persons who received their passports from US Embassy Manila recently in just 2 or 3 days. There are always exceptions and it's not unheard of for it to take quite a bit longer but after 3 weeks you definitely might want to start following up. Other ways you can check the status of the passport at US Embassy Manila is to e-mail passportstatus@ustraveldocs.com with the subject and body of the e-mail just the passport number. It should generate an auto-response with the passport status. They also have a web form here https://www.ustraveldocs.com/ph/ph-niv-passportretrieve.asp where you can input the passport number and see the status.. If her CEAC status is "Issued" or the other status updates say it was already shipped yet she still doesn't have it, you can also e-mail LBC at ustraveldocssupport@lbcexpress.com or call the LBC hotline at (02)8858-5999 to verify if they don't have it and are experiencing some delivery issue.

Crime Season?????? https://www.manilastandard.net/news/national/314366454/ncrpo-warns-of-rise-in-crimes-as-ber-months-start.html

I think you are making it way more complicated than it actually is. As Adventine already mentioned up thread, you can just order it online with a credit card at https://www.psaserbilis.com.ph and have it mailed directly to the US. At most she would need to satisfy a clerk at the post office or DHL delivery guy that she is the intended recipient. I'm prettey sure even an expired passport would work there. Alternatly you could order one online and have it sent to her sisters address in the Philippines and just email her a scan of a letter authorizing release to her sister and her expired passport. All the sister has to do is convince a courior to release it. It costs $6 online to try that and high chance of sucess. Or, her mother is able to directly claim her own daughter's birth certificate from PSA if that is an option. Compared to having lawyers doing FOA requests, multiple affidavits, SPA's etc the "just order one online" option seems pretty simple.

Ultimately the name that appears on the spouses Japanese passport will be the name that appears on the visa, green card, social security card and therefore everything derived from those documents. Changing the name after all of those are already issued is costly and time consuming in the US. So, if she wants to and intends to change her name, it will be a huge benefit to change her Japanese passport as soon as it is practical and just start using her married name for everything if that is the name she actually intends to use.

US Embassy Manila's social media campaign on the issue.

My opinion on that type of mistake is that it has no legal bearing on whether you are actually legally married or not. Even with the mistake you most certainly ARE legally married in the eyes of the Philippines and therefore in the eyes of the US as well. No court in either country would ever overturn your marriage over such a trivial mistake. So it is a completely valid marriage certificate as is. Since your are showing Philippines as the country of the beneficiary you need a PSA copy of the marriage certificate though. The "civil registry" (Local Civil Registry) is not adequate by itself.

For comparison, the previous 2015 guidelines are here. https://immigration.gov.ph/images/ImmigrationLaw/2017_Feb/18_2015Jun15_IACAT_RevisedGuidelines.pdf Not that they were ever adhered to much.

I found the official PDF document. https://www.doj.gov.ph/files/2023/IACAT/2023 Updated Guidelines (for publishing)_1.pdf I assume enforcement will continue to be completely random without any rhyme or reason. It introduces a few new rules but is not completely dissimilar from the previous guidelines for departure which was never even remotely applied consistently. Much of it is actually not new. For the OP my guess would be than a 74-yr-old father visiting their US daughter sponsor would pass Philippine immigration trouble free "just because".

I'm not saying it is completely legal to drive. I'm saying it is a very minor infraction with fairly trivial consequences even in the worst case scenario. 12500(a), when the driver is in possession of an otherwise valid licence would be an infraction (ticket) with a maximum penalty of $250 (which would almost certainly be dismissed if the driver corrected the licence situation and showed the court.) No one is getting arrested, no cars are getting impounded, it's not a moving violation, it doesn't affect your driving record or insurance or anything else. If there was no evidence the driver EVER had a licence anywhere or there were multiple occurrences then there is a small chance 12500(a) could be charged as a misdemeanor. Those circumstances don't seem to apply here. If the driver is driving with a suspended or revoked license that is a whole different charge and that is where it starts getting serious.

One thing to consider about California law is that nowhere does it say that not getting a California drivers license within 10 days revokes or in any other way invalidates a valid overseas or out of state drivers license. It is as valid as it ever was until a court or DMV hearing says otherwise. You are still a legally licensed driver. What you ARE guilty of, is the fairly trivial administrative infraction of not getting a California drivers license in 10 days. It means you are late, it doesn't mean you are unlicensed. Most likely any police officer would not even question it or else just warn you. If you got a really mean, ill-tempered officer who just didn't like you, he would write you a ticket and send you on your way. There is no cause or grounds for them to do anything more. The ticket is not a moving violation, does not go on you driving record, there are no points or any other consequences. If you just paid the ticket it's probably like $150 fine. If you showed up at traffic court and showed them you had corrected the situation with a newly acquired California drivers license, they would dismiss the whole thing for like a $20 fee. It is at most a minor "fix-it ticket".

Yep. It didn't get my account canceled but I did have a Citi phone rep tell me it was absolutely impossible to add an authorized user without a social security number. She said it couldn't be done. So I hung up, went on citi.com and two minutes later successfully added my wife as an authorized user with nothing more than a name and a birth date..

Rejected what look to be very high quality photocopies. I find this account 100% credible. Not in English but very much got a 221g for not wet ink copy of a divorce decree. Rejected a photocopy Another one where at least she got it resolved quickly. Those are just a sample from only like the last 2 or 3 weeks at US Embassy Manila. There's more.

I would allow that there may, or may not be differences in original document requirements between K1 and IR1 (?????) The embassy sends out the same generic checklist for both. For CR1/IR1, in just the month of July alone, I personally know of at least 6 persons who actually received 221g's from US Embassy Manila to send in an original certified copy of a petitioner’s divorce decree because a photocopy brought to the interview was not accepted. I know of no one who said they successfully made it through US Embassy Manila with a photocopy of a divorce decree. I haven't heard any recent K1 accounts so I couldn't argue one way or another if they apply a looser standard to the same documents for K1's. But for CR-1/IR-1 an interviewee has about zero chance of making it through US Embassy Manila with a photocopied divorce decree.

You would have to ask the court about that. I'm sure every court in the country is different. Some courts might handle it same day but I have also heard of courts requiring a written request. Also make sure it's a certified copy. Some courts have the copy, and the certification, as two seperate fees..

US Embassy Manila is being wildly unpredictable with their scheduling this year. They now seem to be using the expedite system for EVERYONE as a roundabout way of switching over to all self-scheduling and completely eliminating any scheduling by NVC. In January this year they expedited EVERYONE who was DQ for spousal visas. Then there was no spousal visa scheduling activity at all, save for a handful of actual expedites, up until June 26. On June 26 they expedited EVERYONE who was DQ up until about May 15. Since then there has been no further scheduling so as it stands now anyone DQ from May 15 onward is waiting for scheduling. Presumably by another "mass auto-expedite". When that will happen is remains a mystery.

If you need to send her an original copy from WA State, LBC Express has branches in Seattle and Tacoma if that works out. For documents from San Diego to Luzon, LBC charged us $12 and took 5 days with tracking. FedEx, UPS or DHL were charging like $80 or more.

It has to be an original certified copy from the court. US Embassy Manilla will not accept a printed scan or photocopy of the court's certification. US Embassy Manilla has been handing out many 221gs lately on just that issue.

If you don't submit them apparently the embassy staff cannot see them. If you are already DQ they will not be reviewed by NVC but would be visible to the embassy.

All Utah online marriages must be registered through the Philippine Consulate in San Francisco. Their instructions and requirements are here. https://pcgsanfrancisco.org/civil-registry/ (select the "REPORT OF MARRIAGE" drop down) Previously they were requiring an affidavit explaining that it was a virtual ceremony since obviously the Filipino spouse doesn't have a copy of their US visa. However, currently they seem to have completely dropped that requirement. There is also an affidavit of delayed registration mentioned if the marriage was not reported within a year. That does not seem to apply here either, so most likely no affidavits are required. The best way to handle getting the forms notarized is to fill out the pdf ROM form, save it and e-mail it to the Filipino spouse. Then the Filipino spouse can print copies of it and take it to a Philippine notary where they can sign and have the copies notarized. (FOUR original wet signed and notarized copies). Make sure the Filipino spouse notifies the Philippine notary to reserve half the space in the notary box for a second notarization or else the Philippine notary will take up the whole page. Then have the Philippine spouse mail you the original forms and you take them to a US notary where you can sign and have the copies notarized.

A girlfriend (or a boyfriend, because I am confused) was,,,, a "friend" back then. I'd leave it at that and not think much about it further.