Local US CIS Office Review: Los Angeles CA
Review Topic: cis_topic
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| Event |
Description |
| Review Date : |
April 19, 2012 |
| Embassy Review : |
I wanted to share our adjustment of status interview because the experiences on this website that people shared have helped me & my wife a lot through this exhausting process.
First the background info.
I'm a US citizen and my wife is mexican and adjusting from a B1/B2 visa.
We married in Sept. 2009 but had been living apart until last october when she arrived in the us for a business trip, after which she would stay with me for a month. during her visit, my temporary job became permanent allowing me to support us in the US, so when I found out we could adjust her status because she was inspected at the POE even though it was with a B1/B2 Visa, I asked her to stay and go through the process immediately because I was tired from all the hassle and expense of traveling back and forth to visit each other. She talked with her company to arrange a leave of absence and since she's in such good standing with the company it was granted.
So here's the timeline:
12-16-11 - Sent i130/i485 package to Chicago lock box.
12-19-11 - Received NOA1 for i130 and a second for i485
12-28-11 - Received Biometrics Appointment letter
1-12-12 - Biometrics successfully done
3-16-12 - received NOA2 interview appointment
4-18-12 - Interview 11:00am - approved almost on the spot...read on...
4-18-12 - later in the day - 3:30pm received email: card in production
Here's our interview experience:
Our Appointment was at 11:00am @ the Federal building in Downtown LA (300 N Los Angeles St.). we arrived at 9:30, but there's some construction going on in the building, and that on top of a lot of people waiting to get in, made passing through security very long. we finally got in at 10:45am. My wife was getting very nervous that we would be late, but we got in with 15 minutes to spare.
We turned in our appointment notice at the greeting window.
we sat down and waited. We were called in at about 11:15 so almost on time... Our interviewing officer was very friendly and professional, and made us feel very comfortable. She swore us in, and then she noticed that my wife was very nervous so she turned some music on, and told her to sit back and relax, and that we were just going to have a friendly conversation. That she had nothing to worry about.
She asked for our IDs, and we gave her our passports. She also asked my wife for her b1/b2 visa.
The first thing she did was go over our basic information from the forms. She asked my wife directly. name, address, phone, etc. Then she asked all the y/n questions from the forms. Then she asked for her birth and marriage certificates and translation, as well as my naturalization certificate so she could check them to make sure the photocopies corresponded to the original documents.
As soon as she finished, she punctured the B1/B2 visa, and take away the i94 form from the passport.
Then she asked my wife to tell her my birthdate, how we met, and asked her to identify some people from the photographs we had submitted in our package. Then she checked all of our bonified marriage proof which was also submitted in the package. We had: Car insurance, Life insurance, Dental insurance, vision insurance, Cel phone statements with the family plan including her name. Moneygram receipts. She Made sure both our names were in all those documents, which was easy because I took the care to highlight them in bright yellow, on each document.
She asked if we had a lease or a vehicle together and I said that although we do, she is not included in those documents because she does not have a SS number yet. She said, ok no problem. We had a bunch of extra evidence which had been built up since she came here, but she asked for nothing more.
Then she said: After reviewing everything I think I can approve you but I have an issue with your tax returns.
I filed single in 2010 & 2011 because I was advised to do it this way since my wife was a Non Resident Alien. She said this is not right, I have to correct this because they're giving us a 10yr greencard, not a conditional one, due to the fact that we're married for over 2 years, and she will give us an RFE and we'd have 87 days to fix it. She printed out the RFE, and then she recommended that we go to the IRS office which is in the same building and fix it.
I was surprised. In any case this is an IRS issue not a USCIS issue. She said we need to make sure you're paying your taxes. To which I responded, well my taxes are being paid. I have my W2's which prove that. (I thought to myself that in any case I'm paying more because I filed single...) She said, I understand, but you have to fix it...
Anyways, she kept going through the rest of the documents, and said, you guys are good, all we need now is for you to fix the tax issue. She asked for my California ID and my wife's Mexican Driver's License, and she said she would have to photocopy them, and then ask her supervisor to initial the file and RFE and we we could go. She came back about 5 minutes later, and told us that her supervisor was at lunch, so she would give us a chance to go to the IRS and try to fix it, and come back to see her. if we got it fixed, she would approve us today.
So off to the IRS we went where they told us they were not doing corrections on that day, but gave us the procedure to fix it and they would start receiving corrections the next day.
Back again to the USCIS office & we asked for our interviewing officer. she had just called somebody else for an interview so it took about 30 minutes for her to come back and see us again. I explained what happened at the IRS, and she said, ok give me a minute because my supervisor is not back yet from lunch, but once she initials the RFE she will bring it to us and we can go. So we waited again, for about an hour. I'm still very surprised that they're asking me to fix the tax return, and I was telling my wife that I was sure that the supervisor would say we didn't need to do this... Anyways an hour later she came looking for us again and we went to her office again. She said, I got good news, based on all the evidence you have provided (and she complemented us on how well we prepared our package), she would be approving us. But we should still look into fixing my tax returns because it may create an issue if my wife decided to apply for citizenship 3 years later. My wife was so happy she almost gave the officer a HUG!!! I discretely stopped her because it seemed inappropriate to me, so she just shook her hand.
She congratulated us and printed out a letter stating that my wife's AOS application had been approved for permanent residency and to expect a GC within the next 90 days. If we needed to travel, she could call infopass to get a stamp on the passport.
We were so relieved! I knew that tax issue was really a NON issue... but it really threw me off at first when she brought it up. In any case I'll try and fix it anyway, but it did not end up delaying the process any more. we were out of the building at 2:30.
Later that that day, at about 3:30, we got an email saying that the card production had been ordered and we would receive it within 30 days.
I hope you find this review helpful as I have done with many others in VJ.
Good luck with your filings!  |
| Harassment Level : |
Good |
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ver 5.0