Amol_k3

Just wanted to let people know what my congresswoman passed on to me
today. The aide I spoke at her office said that NBC said that they are
heavily backlogged and it is taking them upto 90 days *after* they
receive the additional evidence to process the RFE. So basically the
aide said that I need to wait till Mar 9 to hit my 90 day mark and then
contact their office again if I haven't heard anything, but before that
there is nothing they can do to speed things up. I will go ahead and
contact my senator now and see if they can do something.

Regards,
Amol

Matthew Udall

Originally posted by amol_k3
    > Just wanted to let people
know what my congresswoman passed on to me today. The aide I spoke at
her office said that NBC said that they are heavily backlogged and it is
taking them upto 90 days *after* they receive the additional evidence to
process the RFE. So basically the aide said that I need to wait till
Mar 9 to hit my 90 day mark and then contact their office again if I
haven't heard anything, but before that there is nothing they can do to
speed things up. I will go ahead and contact my senator now and see if
they can do something.
    >
    > Regards,
    > Amol

You are of course
free to contact whom ever you want, but I wanted to point out that the
USCIS themselves ask that we pick one method of communication with them
and stick with it. In other words, if you contact them yourself about a
problem (or when I contact them about a problem), then one should not
have someone else contact them again about the same thing.

In other
words, it "really pisses them off" when they have to answer multiple
inquiries about the same thing from multiple people sending the same
inquiry (their words spoken at AILA liaison meetings, not mine). It's a
huge waste of their time (and from what you say, they are already
swamped with work).

But who knows, maybe it will be like it is
sometimes for a child who gets turned down by Mom, so he runs to Dad to
ask for the same thing.

Good luck with your case.

Amol_k3

Thanks for the advice Matt - I know what you mean. I have tried to keep
faith in the system and "play by the rules", but with every passing day
it is becoming harder not to become cynical and skeptical about the
whole system. I can understand the fact that they are overwhelmed and
swamped. If they don't have the resources to process I-129F's that is
one thing, but to have numerous RFE's pending and yet continue to
process newer applications received months after the pending one's is
what my problem is with. All I want is some sort of explanation as to
why they are processing the app's the way they are, and I will patiently
wait my turn.

Regards,
Amol

Originally posted by Matthew
Udall
    > You are of course free to contact whom ever you want, but I
wanted to point out that the USCIS themselves ask that we pick one
method of communication with them and stick with it. In other words, if
you contact them yourself about a problem (or when I contact them about
a problem), then one should not have someone else contact them again
about the same thing.
    >
    > In other words, it "really pisses them off"
when they have to answer multiple inquiries about the same thing from
multiple people sending the same inquiry (their words spoken at AILA
liaison meetings, not mine). It's a huge waste of their time (and from
what you say, they are already swamped with work).
    >
    > But who knows,
maybe it will be like it is sometimes for a child who gets turned down
by Mom, so he runs to Dad to ask for the same thing.
    >
Good luck with
your case.

Andy Platt

"amol_k3" <member20494@british_expats.com> wrote:

    > whole system. I can understand the fact that they are overwhelmed and
    > swamped. If they don't have the resources to process I-129F's that is
    > one thing, but to have numerous RFE's pending and yet continue to
    > process newer applications received months after the pending one's is
    > what my problem is with. All I want is some sort of explanation as to

Hmm, I'm not sure I agree with you here. Let's assume that USCIS never makes
a mistake and asks for an RFE on anything you've already sent. Wouldn't you
agree that that incomplete petition should be processed at a lower priority
than one that was submitted correctly and could be got out of the way
faster? I certainly would expect a correctly filed petition to be processed
quicker.

Of course, USCIS frequently make mistakes or send RFEs when they don't
really need to. That's what I would like them to improve.

Andy.

Goldrush

Originally posted by amol_k3
    > Just wanted to let people
know what my congresswoman passed on to me today. The aide I spoke at
her office said that NBC said that they are heavily backlogged and it is
taking them upto 90 days *after* they receive the additional evidence to
process the RFE. So basically the aide said that I need to wait till
Mar 9 to hit my 90 day mark and then contact their office again if I
haven't heard anything, but before that there is nothing they can do to
speed things up. I will go ahead and contact my senator now and see if
they can do something.
    >
    > Regards,
    > Amol

I don't know if
its possible for you to do this or not, but I would go to India and file
your I-130 over there. She would get her immigrant visa within 4 months.
From what you have said, your I-129F will not be approved before middle
of March. Then, it takes couple more weeks to get it past NVC and onto
the Consulate. Then, hopefully, your wife will submit her packet 3
within a day or two after the Consulate receives the app. Then, it takes
at least 2 months before you get an interview.

So, you are looking at
sometimes in June before she can come to the U.S. ... at the earliest.
That is if we hope for the best.

While with DCF, you will get things
done at around the same time and maybe earlier, and she would not deal
with the stupid ins until her citizenship thing comes up.

If I had
gotten an RFE, I was definitely going to India over last Thanksgiving
and filing DCF. Even after my wife getting her K-3, I still think that I
should have done DCF.

Amol_k3

I have been debating everyday for the past month whether I should cancel
the K-3 and go for the DCF in India. You're absolutely right that timeline-
wise, it will almost end up being the same thing and will be much less
of a hassle since we won't have to worry about EAD, AOS, etc. I'm
honestly just paranoid about cancelling the K-3 at this stage and having
something go wrong at Delhi and then being back at square one... though
it is a very straightforward case with everything according to Indian
norms, so I don't see why there should be any problems. Now I really
feel stupid for not having done DCF when I was there in December... but
it looked like the I-129F would get approved soon. I am going to have
to give it a lot of thought this weekend...

Thanks,
Amol


Originally posted by goldrush
    > I don't know if its
possible for you to do this or not, but I would go to India and file
your I-130 over there. She would get her immigrant visa within 4 months.
From what you have said, your I-129F will not be approved before middle
of March. Then, it takes couple more weeks to get it past NVC and onto
the Consulate. Then, hopefully, your wife will submit her packet 3
within a day or two after the Consulate receives the app. Then, it takes
at least 2 months before you get an interview.
    >
    > So, you are looking
at sometimes in June before she can come to the U.S. ... at the
earliest. That is if we hope for the best.
    >
    > While with DCF, you will
get things done at around the same time and maybe earlier, and she would
not deal with the stupid ins until her citizenship thing comes up.
    >
If
I had gotten an RFE, I was definitely going to India over last
Thanksgiving and filing DCF. Even after my wife getting her K-3, I still
think that I should have done DCF.

Derrick Williams

amol_k3 <member20494@british_expats.com> wrote in message news:<>...
    > Just wanted to let people know what my congresswoman passed on to me
    > today. The aide I spoke at her office said that NBC said that they are
    > heavily backlogged and it is taking them upto 90 days *after* they
    > receive the additional evidence to process the RFE.

I am in a similar situation as you. My response to my RFE was received
by them on December 30th. It seems fair to me that once they get a
response to an RFE, they should put the response with the application
and put it in the front of the queue. My horrible crime was not to put
an original signature on the application, which was admittedly
boneheaded of me but having to wait an extra 90 days seems kind of an
excessive punishment.

After all, when I go to the post office, if I make a mistake with a
form or used the wrong one, the clerk will let me stand aside as she
helps people behind me, and as soon as I correct my mistake, I'm
allowed to be helped by the clerk as soon as she is free.

On the other hand, in selfishness, if I had completed my application
perfectly the first time, unlike other people not as attractive or
intelligent than I, then I would be in the opinion that the USCIS
should speedily process correctly completed applications and have
nothing but contempt for utter cretins who obviously will never amount
to any good if they cannot navigate the rules and procedures of
filling out a I-129F, and instead focus on new I-129F's to process.
Whichever gets *my* application processed first is cool for me!

My 90 days will be on March 31st, so based on your experience I will
wait until then to contact my Congressman. I will find a privacy
release form and will compose a businesslike letter stating the facts
of my case and what exactly I want them to do. Because I live close to
NYC, I am figuring that it's going to be something they routinely do,
so I won't need to go into much explanation of the immigration
process. There is an office right in town so I plan to do it in
person, to talk to the staff. Apparently there is a problem with the
mail due to the anthrax scare a while back, so my Congressman's
website specifically states that walk-ins and faxes are preferable.

I have been wondering if there is a list of case numbers of RFE's in
the November-December range for MSC, my idea is that I could monitor
them to see which ones are being approved, and hopefully have a good
idea of when they'll get around to taking my packet out from
underneath the leg of the wobbly table in the break room to look at
it. Of course, if I start randomly typing in numbers for too long, the
USCIS website scolds me for abusing their website, which makes me
cringe in shame. On the other hand, since there is no indication in
published reports to which RFE receipt dates they are processing,
there's no way to know if they're processing RFE's before or after new
cases are processed, or if they are doing it at all.

Hopefully such a list won't get slapped down, after all, there's no
way to identify who the applicant is, all you know is a case number,
date and the status. Seems to me that it would be really helpful if
the USCIS would just print a report of all cases starting from any day
you enter, so you can see the general state of progress without having
to do any 1337 HAXX0R-ing by typing case numbers one by one like a
cyber-criminal.

-Derrick

Hypertweeky

Originally posted by amol_k3
    > Just wanted to let people
know what my congresswoman passed on to me today. The aide I spoke at
her office said that NBC said that they are heavily backlogged and it is
taking them upto 90 days *after* they receive the additional evidence to
process the RFE. So basically the aide said that I need to wait till
Mar 9 to hit my 90 day mark and then contact their office again if I
haven't heard anything, but before that there is nothing they can do to
speed things up. I will go ahead and contact my senator now and see if
they can do something.
    >
    > Regards,
    > Amol

Aww Amol, I am so
sorry this is happening to you. I wish you nothing but the best!
By the
way what a nice and sunny day! It is cold though:):)

Amol_k3

Originally posted by Hypertweeky
    > Aww Amol, I am so
sorry this is happening to you. I wish you nothing but the best!
    > By
the way what a nice and sunny day! It is cold though:):)


Thanks for the wishes Hyper... you are always smiling :D It seems NBC
is speeding up, so let us hope for the best. The weather this weekend
has warmed up nicely! :)

Spahi

I also have an RFE pending with MSC center. 1st NOA was 09/05/03 RFE
01/14/04, and Reply was received on 01/30/04. I also have contacted my
congresman, and her aide is assisting me. I talked to my wife and she
told me that she is coming over on her visitor's visa in May even if
the I-129F application is not approved. I can totally understand the
frustration with this whole process. Good luck.