- President James Madison
Anonymous - Eden Prairie, MN
I am briefing about my situation I have faced with the July visa bulletin.I came to know on June 13th that all the EB categories are current. Then I had sent a mail to murthy law firm to make sure that the update came in July visa bulletin was reliable information or not.
On the second day they told me that they have confirmed the information with DOS and USCIS and asked us to send a list of documents which I need to file. The list includes Medical Exam,Photo, Birth affidavits as my original birth certificates was prepared after one year of my birth. The same case with my wife. I am working with OfficeMax currently and I travel every week to Chicago. So my lawyer has asked me to send all the papers within 2 weeks. Since I am traveling I don't get enough time to collect all the documents. Even I cannot take leave on those days since I was a critical resource for re launching office.com website project on end of this month.
So I called up my wife who is busy with my 2 yr old kid. Even though she is busy with my son who needs attention always since he is suffering from reflex disease. But I told her that this is the last chance which we have and asked her get detail of documents which we have to prepare.
Then she called up all the medical exam clinics and there was no availability for next two weeks. The she tried calling couple of hospitals and finally she begged one of the receptionist and got an appointment on Friday Morning. Then I asked my manager for permission to leave on Thursday so that I can come and attend the Medical Exam. Then I rushed back on Friday and we went for a medical with my kid early morning.
Then we have to take shots and test and it took 4 hrs to complete the procedure. Then they asked not to take bath for next 2 days because of the skin test. But we supposed to go for a Church Retreat for that weekend which was planned earlier, even though we had some difficulties with the shot which we had taken, we made it for the retreat. Then we have to stay over night to fill the applications.
Then on Monday we sent the application to the lawyer and on next week we got a reply from lawyers with the review list. Then she asked us to get 2 affidavits for both myself and my spouse from persons whose age is 10 yrs older than us. Luckily our relatives stay in Minnesota, we have to drive all the way around 50 miles to get the affidavit certificate. The difficult part was that to get it notarized by a secretary. But we could manage the old relatives to get to the officer. It took almost 7 hrs to complete that process and it was 1.00 AM in midnight when we drove back to our home.
While I am on travel I have got one more week to submit the application and on that day lawyer told the affidavit was not correct.
We have to remove some of the wording from the letter. So again we have to drive 50 miles on the next weekend to get it notarized.
Some how under the pressure we managed to get that and send another set of documents to the attorney. Since the lawyers are very busy with other applicants, we have to call them regularly to get an answer.
Then after all this we managed to submit the application on Thursday June 28th and after that we didn't get any answer from the attorney about what is going to happen. Whether the attorney will find some other documents they need or we have to get the birth affidavit again.
It was sleepless night for me and wife on 29th and 30th. Then on 30th we came to know that DOS will issue an updated visa bulletin which will become visa numbers unavailable for all the categories. It was shocking news for me and my family. We couldn't sleep or eat on that night and we don't know whether the lawyer has submitted our application.
Then finally we gave up all the plans over the weekend and stayed home, because we couldn't do anything and our mind was upset for next 2 days. We prayed god when we heard the rumor on that weekend that it should not be real. But it has happened on July 2nd and it was one of the day which we remember for the entire life. There are some other struggles which we have made to get the documents like banking account verification letter, employment letter in a special format etc...
Then after one week I just calculated how much money and effort I had spent for last 2 to 3 weeks.
Lawyer fees to file AOS, EAD and AP for myself and my wife - $3600
Medical Exam - $375
Photo - $90
Fedex Air Express - $90 (3 times we have to send the details to lawyer)
Copier and other services - $20
I took off on 2 days - 16 hrs of work(16*45) - 720
Taxi(my wife has to travel to get some of the paper work) - $175
USCIS filing fee - $1300( which they may or may not return)
So a total of $6280 which I had spent for this because of this July visa bulletin.
Now in this situation:
1) I cannot go to India for vacation to see my parents
2) I am not able to do my H1 extn as my H1 is getting expired in Jan 2008. Since I am not sure what is going to happen now?
I hope something which will favor my situation will come in next 2 weeks.
