Us Greencard Interview

[daveh]

It's amazing how time flies. It seems like such a short while ago that my wife was preparing for her visa interview. That was 8 months ago.

Now, we are preparing for her greencard interview. Does anyone have any advice to give for the greencard interview? In particular, I want to know how long it takes and what kinds of questions are asked.

I believe the purpose of this interview is to make sure the relationship is bonafide. So we will be bringing joint account bank statements, photos together and with my family, as well as some plane tickets for a trip we took together. Will this be sufficient or should we expect the third degree?

[jimbob]

It's amazing how time flies. It seems like such a short while ago that my wife was preparing for her visa interview. That was 8 months ago.

Now, we are preparing for her greencard interview. Does anyone have any advice to give for the greencard interview? In particular, I want to know how long it takes and what kinds of questions are asked.

I believe the purpose of this interview is to make sure the relationship is bonafide. So we will be bringing joint account bank statements, photos together and with my family, as well as some plane tickets for a trip we took together. Will this be sufficient or should we expect the third degree?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I have been through the INS in the US. Tell the truth and bring all your documentation. Be prepared to deal with morons and imbeciles. Be as polite as possible and do not lie. If you lie then you are screwed.

The INS was a nightmare. I would queue up at 4/5 in the morning for 3 hours, then get into another queue, pick up an application form and a number, wait two hours for the number to be called then be told I had the wrong form and to come back the next day.

Good luck.

[daveh]

I have been through the INS in the US. Tell the truth and bring all your documentation. Be prepared to deal with morons and imbeciles. Be as polite as possible and do not lie. If you lie then you are screwed.

The INS was a nightmare. I would queue up at 4/5 in the morning for 3 hours, then get into another queue, pick up an application form and a number, wait two hours for the number to be called then be told I had the wrong form and to come back the next day.

Good luck.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I'm not sure what forms you are talking about. We filed all the forms and did the biometrics months ago. This is the greencard interview. Basically, they accepted our forms and scheduled an appointment for 8 am. Not sure why one would queue up 3-4 hours before their scheduled appointment.

This reminds me of my wife's biometric (fingerprinting) and Social Security Administration appointments. Her friend told her horror stories of when she went for those interviews. She had to wait for 4 hours for each one. We were in and out of each in 20 minutes.

[Fried Rice]

I have been through the INS in the US. Tell the truth and bring all your documentation. Be prepared to deal with morons and imbeciles. Be as polite as possible and do not lie. If you lie then you are screwed.

The INS was a nightmare. I would queue up at 4/5 in the morning for 3 hours, then get into another queue, pick up an application form and a number, wait two hours for the number to be called then be told I had the wrong form and to come back the next day.

Good luck.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I'm not sure what forms you are talking about. We filed all the forms and did the biometrics months ago. This is the greencard interview. Basically, they accepted our forms and scheduled an appointment for 8 am. Not sure why one would queue up 3-4 hours before their scheduled appointment.

This reminds me of my wife's biometric (fingerprinting) and Social Security Administration appointments. Her friend told her horror stories of when she went for those interviews. She had to wait for 4 hours for each one. We were in and out of each in 20 minutes.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I went through the process in Orlando and it was not bad. However you should try to be in the front of the line which means getting there around 4am. Some of the late arriving people they sent home and told them to come back another day. I think we finished everything up by about 2pm. Just be patient and keep smiling, if you get inpatient with them your in big trouble. For the actual interview once you get in you should have pictures like you say, tickets anything you can bring that will show that you 2 are living together. Vacations together are a big plus, we had gone to europe the beach and I think them seeing that really helped. The more you have the less they look through it. As far as questions they asked some pointless questions I thought at the time. What side of the bed do you sleep on, what color is your wifes tooth brush (I missed that one), where you met. They will ask you about your wifes family, her siblings names stuff like that. Some of the questions I thought would be hard to know if we had lived together for 10 years, but it was just part of the game. Our interviewer was a lady and she was trying to intimidate us, but as long as you tell the truth you should be fine. I heard if there is a big age difference they might get on you about that, my wife was actually 2 years older than me so I don't know if that is truly the case.

Just try to relax it is necessary step, and after the interview go and suck down a few frosty beverages.

Best of luck.

[daveh]

That was quite painless. The interview lasted all of 7 minutes. Our appointment was for 8am, their website said to show up 15 minutes early. We got there around 7:45, there was one other couple in the waiting room. We put our appointment letter in the inbox. About ten minutes later, someone came out and called our name (before the other couple).

As we walked back to his office, I saw a few large boxes, one marked "denied" and another marked "approved", can't remember what the other one said. But all boxes were emtpy. I guess it was too early in the day.

When we got in the room, he swore us in and we sat down.

First he asked for her passport, and my id. I gave him my passport because I figured if I showed him my driver's license, I would also have to show him my birth certificate to prove I was a citizen.

Next he asked her some questions verifying the information on the application.

- "Do you still live at ...?"

- "What is your birth date?"

...

Checking off the information on the form as each was answered.

Then he asked her if she had a job, she responded that she did start a job about two weeks ago. She told him where she worked. His next question to her was, "How did you meet?" and she explained very briefly with NO details, basically "In Bangkok, he was a teacher, and I was his student". I was expecting him to ask some follow up questions to get more in depth, but he didn't.

Then he looked at me and asked if we had any bank records that showed we lived together. That's when I pulled out my "Evidence" folder, which is about 1.5 inches thick including copies. I started flipping through from the first page looking for the bank statement. Along the way, he got to see photos, medical bills, a wedding invitation addressed to both of us, the form adding her to my benefits at work, ... after which he said that it was obvious we lived together. Just then, my wife found the bank statement at the back and pulled it out. He looked at it very briefly.

That was it. He said he was approving her application and spent the next few minutes stamping her passport, and explaining some things to us and we were done. We got back into the car at 8:04am.

From Fiancée Petition application to conditional permanent resisdence in about 13 months. It could have been a month or two faster had I taken some short cuts, but I think this is very reasonable.