Us Green Card Wait

[corkscrew]

My Thai wife and I were married in the US over a year ago....she has gone through the medical, the fingerprinting and we she has had her I-512 (free to travel to USA without further visa) for a year. And we spent most of the year in BKK where we have lived for almost 5 years. We are back in the USA awaiting the Interview date (for the Green Card).

Is there anyone out there with any 'wait time' experience? We were told originally (a year ago) that it is about one year from the issuance of the I-512 until the Interview. Now the time seems to have been pushed up to 15 months.

Any thoughts?

[donx]

First, let me say that everyone's experience will be different. I know this because a couple that applied the same time we did have experienced a different waiting period, mainly because of where we live. This is because there are regional INS (at least that is what they used to be called) centers handling the case load for the various districts.

My wife and I live in a Maryland suburb of Washington DC. We submitted our paperwork to the Vermont INS center in November 1999. We were told it would take over one year, so we waited. And waited. I called after a year and they said to call to check the status in a few months. When I called again in April, my wife was visiting family in Thailand, but I was told that there was a problem and for me to call back when she returned because they needed her authorization to talk to me. When she returned, we called and found out that the Vermont office sent our file for archiving without processing it. Basically they f***ed up! So, by the time we had our interview, it was almost 2 years since our application was submitted (October 2001). The couple I referred to earlier live in California and their interview occurred in the Spring of 2001, about 18 months from the original application.

Since 9/11, I would expect things are even worse. Be aware that even after the interview, the green card your wife receives will be a permanent residence with a condition. The condition is that you have to stay married for another two years (there are exceptions, such as death of the spouse or spousal abuse) after your interview and 90 days prior to the end of those two years, you need to apply for the removal of the condition. Failure to do so will mean your wife is an illegal alien. After submitting this removal of the condition (August 2003), we received another notice telling us to contact them again if we haven't heard back from them within a year.

This January, my wife and kids went to Thailand for 4 months. Because I was afraid we would be called in for another interview while she was there, I called the Vermont office to find out the status of our application. They told us it was taking them 22 months to process the removal of condition applications. Surprisingly, this month (less than one year since our application), we recieved a letter telling us to go to the Baltimore office to receive a new green card with the condition removed. As for our friends in California, they are still waiting for the removal of condition notification/interview.

Other things that affect the time delay include the fact that my wife and I have had two kids born since being married. This probably convinced the Vermont center that we did not need to be interviewed a second time and perhaps we were not scrutinized as much as our friends who are older with no children between them and two Thai teenagers that are children from a previous marriage.

That's been my experience. My advice to you is to periodically check the status of your application. I think you can do it via the internet, though I always ended up calling the Vermont center directly.

Good luck, be patient, and don't be too worried about it.

[OldAsiaHand]

And we spent most of the year in BKK where we have lived for almost 5 years.

Any thoughts?

Yeah. Why in the world didn't you file your application through the embassy in Bangkok if you were here?

The whole process is infinitely more controlable and inevitably a heck of a lot faster doing it that way. If you are seeking US residency for a foreign-born spouse, your first choice should ALWAYS be to do it through the US embassy in the country of the spouce's residence, provided you can colorably claim to be 'resident' there as well, at least temporarily, at the time the application is filed.

[corkscrew]

And we spent most of the year in BKK where we have lived for almost 5 years.

Any thoughts?

Yeah. Why in the world didn't you file your application through the embassy in Bangkok if you were here?

The whole process is infinitely more controlable and inevitably a heck of a lot faster doing it that way. If you are seeking US residency for a foreign-born spouse, your first choice should ALWAYS be to do it through the US embassy in the country of the spouce's residence, provided you can colorably claim to be 'resident' there as well, at least temporarily, at the time the application is filed.

The US Embassy in BKK (or elsewhere) does not handle I-512 extension requests. They must be done in the USA and the applicant must appear in person.

[donx]

corkscrew,

A difference between your situation and mine is that we used a fiancee visa to get my wife-to-be into the US. Medical screening was performed prior to her arrival in the US, but the fingerprinting was done after our application was submitted and just prior to our interview. I don't know if this has any affect on the time to process the application.

What regional center did you submit your application to?

[corkscrew]

corkscrew,

A difference between your situation and mine is that we used a fiancee visa to get my wife-to-be into the US. Medical screening was performed prior to her arrival in the US, but the fingerprinting was done after our application was submitted and just prior to our interview. I don't know if this has any affect on the time to process the application.

What regional center did you submit your application to?

Miami! And our immigration lawyer is guessing as November as being the expected date for the interview.

We are getting an extension on her I-512 and expect to come back to BKK in the mean time.

BTW, who do you check the status on the Internet.

I was very impressed with you helpful and detailed answer to my first question. THANK YOU very much.

[donx]

corkscrew,

You are very welcome.

Check here for information regarding setting up an account for your wife:

https://egov.immigration.gov/cris/jsps/index.jsp

and

http://uscis.gov/graphics/services/cris/html/faq.htm

As I said earlier, I never used the internet service, but I saw it was available.

The following link can provide you with answers to other questions. I used it to find the links above by selecting 'S', then going to the 'Status' section which referred me to 'Case Status' section where I found these links.

http://uscis.gov/graphics/faqsgen.htm

By the way, since you have been married for more than two years, your wife will probably not get a conditional permanent resident card. In fact, if my initial interview was in November 2001 instead of October 2001, my wife also wouldn't have recieved a conditional permanent resident card.

One more useful website is:

http://travel.state.gov/visa_services.html#niv

From there you can get to this:

http://travel.state.gov/spouse_fiance(e).html

I hope you find the above websites useful. They were for me because I used the information they provided and never needed to hire a lawyer to get my wife's permanent resident card.

[corkscrew]

corkscrew,

You are very welcome.

Check here for information regarding setting up an account for your wife:

https://egov.immigration.gov/cris/jsps/index.jsp

and

http://uscis.gov/graphics/services/cris/html/faq.htm

As I said earlier, I never used the internet service, but I saw it was available.

The following link can provide you with answers to other questions. I used it to find the links above by selecting 'S', then going to the 'Status' section which referred me to 'Case Status' section where I found these links.

http://uscis.gov/graphics/faqsgen.htm

By the way, since you have been married for more than two years, your wife will probably not get a conditional permanent resident card. In fact, if my initial interview was in November 2001 instead of October 2001, my wife also wouldn't have recieved a conditional permanent resident card.

One more useful website is:

http://travel.state.gov/visa_services.html#niv

From there you can get to this:

http://travel.state.gov/spouse_fiance(e).html

I hope you find the above websites useful. They were for me because I used the information they provided and never needed to hire a lawyer to get my wife's permanent resident card.

You are a jewel!!!!!

Thank you so very much for all of your help.

[OldAsiaHand]

The US Embassy in BKK (or elsewhere) does not handle I-512 extension requests. They must be done in the USA and the applicant must appear in person.

I think you misunderstood. What I was saying is that, if you were living in Bangkok, you should have initiated the whole green card process here at the embassy in the first place. That would have saved you the endless unnecessary headaches of dealing with immigration in the US. The I-512, for example, would have been irrelvant.

[corkscrew]

The US Embassy in BKK (or elsewhere) does not handle I-512 extension requests. They must be done in the USA and the applicant must appear in person.

I think you misunderstood. What I was saying is that, if you were living in Bangkok, you should have initiated the whole green card process here at the embassy in the first place. That would have saved you the endless unnecessary headaches of dealing with immigration in the US. The I-512, for example, would have been irrelvant.

The marriage-to-a-Thai and Green Card procedure works a lot faster if the marriage takes place in the USA (using a regular tourist visa - not the engagement one). Also, a pre-nuptial agreement is much stronger if executed in the USA with the Thai wife being represented by an American lawyer and an American lawyer who speaks Thai and is also a member of the Thai bar.

[mrvietnam2001]

Originally ( last year) we were told as long as 3 years. We just received notification that we need to go for the fingerprints and make sure all our papers are complete. The letter went on to say that if we complete this and send to them within 45 days then we can expect to wrap this up shortly after that.

In Tampa.

Rgrds

Mr Vietnam

[OldAsiaHand]

The marriage-to-a-Thai and Green Card procedure works a lot faster if the marriage takes place in the USA (using a regular tourist visa - not the engagement one). Also, a pre-nuptial agreement is much stronger if executed in the USA with the Thai wife being represented by an American lawyer and an American lawyer who speaks Thai and is also a member of the Thai bar.

We're still not communicating here, although your attitude makes it seem that you already think you know so much that it's a wonder you would want anyone else's advice at all. Still, let me try one more time.

Where you are married, let alone where your prenup is drawn up, has nothing whatsoever to do with where you apply for US residency for your spouse. That is determined solely by your residency at the time the application is filed. If you can show you are resident in Thailand, you can apply through the US Embassy here and save a lot of headaches. That's all there is to it.

For example, my wife and I were married in the US years ago and then subsequently, while living in Thailand, applied for my wife's US residency through the embassy here. It was an utterly painless process and competely avoided all the backlogs and difficulties you encountered in dealing with immigration in the US. That's all I have been trying to tell you, if you care, but you seem far more interested in telling me that I don't know what I'm talking about than trying to profit from my experience.

So enjoy your time dealing with Immigration in the US. I'm sure you'll be a better person for it.

[corkscrew]

The marriage-to-a-Thai and Green Card procedure works a lot faster if the marriage takes place in the USA (using a regular tourist visa - not the engagement one). Also, a pre-nuptial agreement is much stronger if executed in the USA with the Thai wife being represented by an American lawyer and an American lawyer who speaks Thai and is also a member of the Thai bar.

We're still not communicating here, although your attitude makes it seem that you already think you know so much that it's a wonder you would want anyone else's advice at all. Still, let me try one more time.

Where you are married, let alone where your prenup is drawn up, has nothing whatsoever to do with where you apply for US residency for your spouse. That is determined solely by your residency at the time the application is filed. If you can show you are resident in Thailand, you can apply through the US Embassy here and save a lot of headaches. That's all there is to it.

For example, my wife and I were married in the US years ago and then subsequently, while living in Thailand, applied for my wife's US residency through the embassy here. It was an utterly painless process and competely avoided all the backlogs and difficulties you encountered in dealing with immigration in the US. That's all I have been trying to tell you, if you care, but you seem far more interested in telling me that I don't know what I'm talking about than trying to profit from my experience.

So enjoy your time dealing with Immigration in the US. I'm sure you'll be a better person for it.

I was not a resident of Thailand at the time...I was there on a tourist visa.