littleredscooty

Thank you, I would like to think that very same thing. I really hope the records request is somehow helpful. This is just so puzzling to me.

No, it was never mentioned and nothing was asked about why we had it, etc. Almost nothing about our relationship was asked but basic things such as how did you two meet and the like. At the time of interview, I already had the tax transcript available for the 2023 tax year, along with the three years prior to that, and all of them have my tax status listed as single. Wouldn't that have solidified to them that I was not married?

We did not have any ceremony of any kind, the jewelry thing was actually a gift given the day after we were engaged, but its just that I could see how maybe someone got that impression, despite those photos being dated and an explanation given. But we were in street clothes, parents invited us over for tea and to give me the gift and we did take a photo, but it wasn't a ceremony nor did we have any type of ceremony. The NOC is the no objection certificiate yes, thank you the full name was slipping my mind. It's required for me to get married in India.

I just want to say, I really appreciate your feedback, as it's allowing for a lot of ideas on where to "look" at what could explain this. I have to agree if financials / affdavit were the problem, we would of already been informed at the interview and they wouldn't of put us in 221g over that, so I'm letting go of that angle. We were initially going to do the CR1 route, get married in India and apply. We decided to do the K1 route instead because at the time, it seemed we would get to actually be in person much sooner than CR1 was going to allow. Before changing our minds, I had gone to the consulate and gotten something called an NOC, I had written the consulate to inform them of a marriage notice for us and needing to schedule the NOC. We did include the NOC as part of our petition as we didn't want to hide it, but we of course never actually did get married. I genuinely hadn't even remembered writing to them until recently when I went into my email to do a search of all contact and information coming to and from embassy. Considering the context, the fact that we lived together for 3 months during one visit, some of the photos with family such as the photo where his family is gifting me jewelry, and one photo has several of our friends together for a luncheon, I think it's possible what you are saying "too married for a fiancee visa, not married enough for a spouse visa". I didn't know that was a thing.

That is really helpful to know, thank you! We have done a records request, but in the meantime we are trying to go through everything and suss out what could possibly explain this.

The only thing I can think of is something with the affdavit of support, because I had been unemployed for about seven months within this last year and only had about six weeks of work history and pay data at the time of his interview / when the affdavit was completed. I know there are income guidelines, and I still exceeded them, even with the 7ish months of non employment, but perhaps there was concerns regardless. I have put in a records request to see if anything in our immigration file helps us make sense of what could of happened here. It's hard to believe that after all the time we were together and evidences we have of things that someone could doubt the validity of the relationship but I guess you're right, anything is possible. Clearly something caused this.

Certainly could be, we definitely tried to make the best possible case we could for displaying validity. Including, the three months we lived together and get togethers with elders and extended family of friends, etc. Involvement with family on both sides, vacations we took together as a couple etc. If there was doubt about validity though, I can't for the life of me understand why more questions weren't asked about the relationship beyond some very basic things. Certainly could be, we definitely tried to make the best possible case we could for displaying validity. Including, the three months we lived together and get togethers with elders and extended family of friends, etc. Involvement with family on both sides, vacations we took together as a couple etc. If there was doubt about validity though, I can't for the life of me understand why more questions weren't asked about the relationship beyond some very basic things.

Nope, never arrested nor has he. I haven't even had so much as a traffic ticket.

Hello again, Yes, my beneficiary has been married previously and divorced in 2008. We did provide the notarized copy of the divorce decree, and I would think if that was an issue it would of been noted prior to making it to the embassy, wouldn't it have? There is also online record of the divorce, so that does seem to be a dead end. The reason I'm focused on my qualifications, is because the notice received stated something along the lines of if information obtained during the interview process that wasn't available to the adjudicating officer e.g. uscis when the petition was approved, is believed may render applicant inelgible for a visa is found, the petition needs to be returned. Well, the only new information is the Affdavit of support. While he did bring more photos, more relationship evidence etc. to the interview none of it was ever accepted and looked at. Our I 129f was very front loaded with photos of us, us with friends and families, receipts, boarding passes, correspondances etc. so I guess I could see why they didn't want to look at more relationship evidence persay. I'm not going to say "there's no way he could of lied" because let's be real, anyone could of lied, but I can't see what about because everything submitted related to him had more than one source to verify its authenticity.

Thank you for the input. We are going over things with a fine tooth comb to understand what could of caused this. Seeing as how 1. everything was pushed along up until the embassy interview stage and 2. the letter given, while a canned response, still said something to the effect that if the CO believes that information obtained during the interview was not available to the officer who would of given the green light to the petition, they must of felt we had some type of inelgibility pertaining to info not included in our original I-129f itself. The only additional documentation that was brought to the interview itself, but not as part of the I-129f itself was the affdavit of financial support. While my current income well exceeds financial guidelines, at the time of the interview I had only been back to work for 6 weeks and thus did not have 3 months worth of income reflected in pay stubs.

Fair point, and maybe we didn't spend enough time in person but we had 3 visits; one was 30 days, one was 10 days, and one was 90 days. I feel like we spent a good amount of time together in person but do you feel this is still far too brief?

As you might imagine, the advice I've read is varied and broad, and not always of one consenus. I understand that no one is going to offer up a letter of explanation, apparently, but it has been suggested elsewhere that we do a records request in order to determine the cause of what happened. Are you saying this isn't actually possible?

what is it I would file in order to see what happened? I am trying to figure out what exactly we file for. Is it the freedom of information act records or something else? I can certainly file I just don't quite understand what specific thing I should be requesting.

Thank you for the input! I was more so saying I wonder if my lack of recent pay stubs or because I had a hiatus in employment that was the reason more so than taxes. To my knowledge though we cannot get a joint sponsor on K1 visa, right? Either way, they never questioned finances or raised issue in the interview itself etc. We do want to find out why we were denied in the first place, my understanding is we do that through a FOIA request? I also have an online USCIS accouint for our case, so once the USCIS gets the petition back, would the reason it was returned be stated there? Thank you for your help.

we had 3 in person visits, one visit was 30 days, one visit was 10 days over Christmas/NYE holiday, and the third visit was 90 days

Thank you for the response, I wonder if this was the problem? I did submit last three years of tax returns in which case all three years well exceeded the minimum income limits, I was however unemployed for a period of time after an accident in this last year. I had recently resumed gainful employment about six weeks prior to the interview, and did submit the employment contract and paystubs for what I had been paid, my employment contract was 40 hours per week @44 usd per hour + 66 usd per hour for any time exceeding 40 hours in a working week. I did only have 6 ish weeks of pay stub data that I could provide though, but before my hiatus from working, i was in the same exact field for 7 years, and had been continously employed. That is a great suggestion, and very doable! We could certainly be together during the ceremony this way.

Nothing asked at the interview gives any indication, in fact very little was asked at all. The interview lasted a few minutes of which the majority of that was the CO staring at his computer and not saying anything at all. Asked some basics like where did we meet, when did we get engaged but there was no "grilling" and no "probing" to get more information or better understand sometime the CO may of been questioning, if that makes sense. From what I gather, we can request our immigration records from USCIS in order to learn what the red flags / errors could possibly be? I agree we will need to understand what went wrong with K1, we just have no idea at present.

Hello all, After sitting in 221g for 10 weeks, our status has updated to say it was sent to NVC. From what I am reading, this means we are being denied. We had already discussed that if we were to be denied, we would go the CR-1 route, vs. refiling the K1 petition. If we were to get married in his country, I would need to have been in the country for 30 days and a whole host of other things that will not be feasible. What could work for us is to do the online Utah marriage ceremony, and then me fly out to him for a few weeks right after. We initially did the K1 visa because at the time it was the quicker way to be together in person (or so was the logic, that isn't true, now is it). I am just wondering if anyone here has knowledge or experience of India accepting and recognizing our marriage as legal and valid, if we go the Utah route? Thank you in advance.

In our case, the packet 3 letter came extremely late, so we found out he had to file the ds-160 first after asking them about scheduling an appointment. I would say to check and see if your interviewing consulate has received the packet, if they have give them 7-10 days to issue you your packet 3. If it’s been several weeks since receiving the petition on their end, and beneficiary has not gotten packet 3, you could contact them and see if they instructed you to do ds-160 and then once you do that you will be able to schedule. However, it seems some consulates schedule the interview for you.

221g issued at Mumbai consulate on 04/02. Fiancé was given a white slip that stated file was incomplete therefore undergoing administrative processing. There were no further directions and officer told fiancé he didn’t need to submit or do anything else and AP would be done in 1-2 weeks. CEAC website shows the case status last updated April 04, and still says refused but the same message that we would be contacted once AP is complete displays. Is it normal for the case last update date to change while undergoing AP or does this mean it’s been refused in full? Our petition expires 04/06, do we need to contact them to ask them to extend it so it doesn’t expire while they do AP? Thanks all

I do have a timeline, I do not know why it isn’t showing, sorry about that. Consulate is Mumbai, India

OK that is helpful to know, thank you! Does this mean he can’t be his own financial sponsor then? I don’t know why my timeline isn’t showing up, but his interview will be at Mumbai India consulate.

Hello all, we noticed there is a box where the beneficiary can check to be their own financial sponsor. I am currently back to work after having been unemployed for about 8 months this year. I have worked in the same career field for 8 years and this break which occurred due to medical reasons, was the first gap in employment I had in such time. Nearly all but a few thousand dollars of my savings was eaten up during this time. My tax return meets the minimum guidelines but just barely since it was only 4 months worth of salary. On the other hand, my beneficiary has assets worth roughly 150k usd, as well as ~90k usd in his savings. We are thinking having him apply as being responsible party as the beneficiary for the k-1 visa portion might be a better option in our case. Does anyone know is this possible and if there are requirements he would need to meet in order to do this? Thank you!

Hey All, My fiance's consulate is in Mumbai, India. He has not yet received anything via post mail, but when searching our case status online with the number issued by the NVC it reports it as "ready" and then says the following: "Your case is ready for your interview when scheduled at the U.S. Consular section. If you have already scheduled an appointment for an interview, please prepare your documents as directed in your appointment letter and appear at the consulate on the appointed date and time. Otherwise, please wait until you have been notified of your interview appointment." Am I completely lost on my understanding here? It sounds to me like it's saying if you already scheduled an interview, but if you haven't wait until you have been notified, e.g. they are going to schedule the interview and we don't have to? Any insight/experience is appreciated. Thank you!

Hello All, My fiancee has some concerns about overstaying in U.S. once he comes. We both understand that we must get married within 90 days. From there we would file for his adjustment of status, but he is wondering how long he can remain in U.S. once the AOS has been filed. My understanding is that once we have married, we would file for AOS, and he would be legal to remain for however long it takes for them to finish processing. However, he is worried that if there is no defined expiration, immigration could just kick him out and give him a ban at any time. When you apply for AOS are you given some sort of timeline for continuing to remain in the U.S. that is written on paper?