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| London, United Kingdom |  Review on January 12, 2023: |
ukgreencardlad22
Rating:  | Review Topic: IR-1/CR-1 Visa
I attended my spouse visa interview at the London embassy on the 10th of January 2023.
As posted by others here, there can be a long queue outside the embassy for visa appointments (in my case it was really windy and rainy!) - however if you mention to the staff at the front of the queue that you are attending for an immigration / green card appointment then they will allow you to skip the line.
Once inside, I went through security, and was advised to again skip the queue and speak to reception. They pointed me to the relevant area for my immigrant visa interview, and when I arrived my number was already called by one of the desks.
I went to the first window, handed over my documents (passport, birth certificate, marriage certificate, police certificate) and they were checked, plus one of my photographs was attached to the application. It's worth mentioning that I printed copies of all my documents and also took relationship evidence, but they did not need any of that on the day.
I explained to the person at the window that I had made a mistake on my application form. As the mistake was to do with my police history he asked if I had a Subject Access Request, which I did - so I gave this to him too.
He reassured me that my situation should not be a problem and asked me to sit down and wait for my number to be called again (note - the sticker which had my number on it was removed from my application after the first window, so I recommend you make sure you really remember your number before you hand it over!).
I then waited about 10mins for the person ahead of me to have their interview at the second window, and was called up (it's a bit of a strange setup as you can overhear other people having their interview, which I did not expect). The consular officer was very nice and friendly, I explained again about the mistake on my form and he asked me to explain the situation which I did - he then also told me it wouldn't be a problem.
The majority of the questions were about where and when I had met my wife, what we both do for work and where is she living now - and the officer swiftly told me that my visa had been approved!
The whole interview probably lasted about 5 minutes, and I was in and out of the embassy within about 45 minutes factoring in security, the two people I spoke to at the windows, and the waiting time between.
I was told that as I had booked the courier service my visa would arrive within 10 working days, but I actually received it 2 working days after my interview (12th Jan 23) which was great.
All in all - everyone I spoke to was very friendly and understanding, which is really helpful given the amount of stress that the visa process can generate for an applicant.
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Consulate / USCIS Member Review #31711