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Question if Gary or Ray have time.

My wife's 12-month extension letter for her conditional resident card expires in March of 2005. (the letter is dated March 18, 2004) This is the letter they sent her when she submitted her I-751 petition extending her work and travel authorization pending approval of removal of conditions. I'm hearing that she might need a stamp in her passport to continue working/traveling beyond the expiration date of the letter. Source tells me that we need to make an appointment with the Memphis Service Center to travel there to receive the stamp in person. I'm also told that this appointment should be made using the Infopass system on the CIS website. Can anyone confirm all this? We plan to travel to Peru in Feb. or early March, just before the 12-month extension letter expires.

Thanks for any info from anyone who knows.

RC in TN.

... in response to Perm. Res. Card extension--Gary B.-Ray p..., posted by Red Clay on Jan 11, 2005

They seem to like waiting ‘til the last minute to process those things. Our I-751 took one year and one week to approve through CSC. That was last March and they still haven’t sent the new Green Card.

I have heard of others who were automatically sent a second one-year extension to the Green Card because they had been waiting over a year. If you filed with Texas, it looks like they are over a year behind on I-751’s so I would guess that they will ‘probably’ send her another extension around March but that won’t help you much if you are going to be out of the country at that time.

I think the advice you got to make an appointment with your local office through InfoPass is a good idea. If you haven’t heard anything by about a month or so before your trip, I would go down there and explain your situation. I don’t know if they can give her the I-551 stamp in her passport without the approved I-751, but they could at least get her another temporary extension to her Green Card so you can make your trip.

Commentary: Some of these waiting times are getting ridiculous and they keep increasing the fees supposedly to help them catch up (LOL!). I think the CIS should not be able to cash your fee check until they actually start working on your petition. If it takes them more than 6 months to complete the processing, then the fee should be refunded with no charge.

Texas processing times:

https://egov.immigration.gov/cris/jsps/Processtimes.jsp?SeviceCenter=Texas

Good luck,

Ray

... in response to Re: Perm. Res. Card extension, posted by Ray on Jan 12, 2005

Thanks again Ray!

A few points:
USCIS has made some headway in backlog reduction in 2004,
by completing 600,000 cases received in first 3 quarters of
2004. They seem to be on track on their stated goal to reduce
all petition processing time to no more than 6 months, as of
end of 2006.

http://uscis.gov/graphics/publicaffairs/newsrels/11_09_04_Backlog.pdf

I have some sympathy for their plight; the public expectations and
work demands on USCIS nationwide are enormous. In reality, user
fees only cover a small portion of operational expenses. The better way
to help them IMHO is for the public to continue encouraging public officials
to find ways to help USCIS with more resources, better technology and
better management practices and training and deployment.

Some good news. InfoPass is now available nationwide for addressing
issues such as Red Clay, and he should pursue it IMHO. National Benefits
Center is now doing some initial processing of I-485s and travel and work
petitions to help out local district offices. Texas Service Center (TSC) is getting
a lot of good help from California Service Center (CSC) on many petitions.
CSC has staffed up better and has helped the service centers cut down on
wait times such for the I-129F. In fact, a recent I-129F petition I filed at
TSC was directly forwarded to CSC and has a CSC receipt number.

Some local offices have made improvements. For example, where I
am here, the local office (Philadelphia), is processing green cards in
about 10 months, and the green card is being mailed in 4 weeks
after the interview. The new green card as you know is now fitted
with the latest in anti-counterfeit technology and is practically
counterfeit-proof.

Lastly, hey Ray, your consistently good information and advice
on these public boards is starting to reduce my business :),
and if you have too much free time on your hands, we need
to hire you as an immigration consultant in my office,
Ha!

Good luck, my friend.
GB  
PS I may have mentioned this, but I recently posted up
my 2005 Immigration Newsletter which has news &
&  information which might be helpful to some . Regards.
http://www.usaimmigrationattorney.com/onlineimmigrationnewsletter2005.pdf

... in response to Re: Re: Perm. Res. Card extension, posted by Gary Bala on Jan 12, 2005

Thanks Gary! I’ll try not to cut in on your business too much :-)

I think CIS seems to be putting more priority on the type of cases that are causing family separations (Spouse/child I-130’s, fiancée visas, etc.) which is good news for most of us here. But I think they totally blew it on the K-3’s. Instead of following the intent of congress in the LIFE Act to reunify families as soon as possible, they have been almost ignoring K-3 petitions while they diddle around with other stuff. I think if they had been smart about it, they would have sent all K-3/K-4 and V petitions to Vermont where they at least know how to process a petition in less that a month. I think the NBC fiasco has just about made K-3 visas a worthless waste of the processing fee. Why even bother to apply if the I-130 will beat it through the CIS system? I think they should refund the filing fees of all those folks who couldn’t use the K-3 visa because CIS was sitting on their ass all that time. I think kented and some guys in his position could use that money :-)

And why in the hell is the NBC helping out local district offices with I-485s, travel, and work petitions while there is still a backlog of K-3’s??? To me, that shows a complete lack of concern for those poor slobs who are waiting patiently to get their spouses and children over here. I think someone should be fired for incompetence and they should shut down the NBC and turn it into a parking lot or something more useful.

There, now I feel much better (LOL)

Ray

... in response to NBC rants, posted by Ray on Jan 13, 2005

When we went through the NBC with our K-3, it only took 61 days to be approved, thank God. That was in late 2003. I feel bad for the people who are waiting 6 months or more for their approvals. You are absolutely right. Congress does something with a good intent and then the bureaucracy totally negates that intent.

... in response to Great rant, Ray!, posted by utopiacowboy on Jan 14, 2005

Yes Cowboy, I can remember when they were doing K-3’s in 1-2 months. Now they apparently don’t give a rat’s ass how long it takes. If they created the backlog through their own mismanagement, then they should fix it – on their own time! Lock ‘em all inside the building (with padlocks on the rest rooms) and don’t let ‘em out until they catch up. Let ‘em see how it feels to be separated from their families for a few months and maybe they will understand(?). And if they don’t like that, let them quit and get a real job where they actually fire people for incompetence.

Ray :-)

... in response to NBC rants, posted by Ray on Jan 13, 2005

Thanks.
Next time I visit NBC, I'll try and get you a visitor's pass
so you can pass on those suggestions directly to the
Director's office.
I'm sure it'll make things feel even better (lol)!
Best Regards.

... in response to Re: Perm. Res. Card extension, posted by Ray on Jan 12, 2005

Thanks Ray.

Our trip will be about a month before her extension letter expires, so I guess we're ok for that trip even if we do nothing. Beyond that, I prefer to try to contact them about it rather than wait around assuming they will take action in time to prevent a "lapse" in work/travel authorization.