My ACH Experience on Friday

[Stephen]

Thursday: We arrived at the guz airport about 1:00 pm. It is a large airport but surprisingly was not very crowded when we arrived. I wanted to take a taxis but my SO said the bus was better. We took bus line #6 it is about a 50 minute ride to the end of the line. It makes 1 stop about 15 minutes from the end. We were met at the station, which is actually a hotel parking lot, by Mr. Xie. He took us to his apartment, about a 5 minute taxis ride. Angela and Mr. Xie are very friendly and helpful. There were 3 other ladies staying there and all had just been through the interview. Two had passed and one had not. I interviewed them about what the VO had asked. It seemed to be the standard questions… Where does he work… How did you meet… How many times has he been to China… The one that did not pass said they didn’t even look at her evidence… they said they did not think they had a valid relationship and were sending her case back to the US. She was very sad and crying. Angela said that about 70% of the cases that week had been denied and 50% of them were being sent back to US. Not a good week.

 

Friday: I arrived at the ACH about 1:45 there were about 50 people already sitting in the interview room. There were 6 guys sitting there with blue slips in hand. I went and talked with each one. Four of the slips said they did not prove a valid relationship and the case was being sent back to the US. I felt their anger and pain. They all said that the VO had not even looked at the evidence. It seemed as if the decision had already been made. I asked all the people about their income, Yes I know a touchy subject, but I explained that I was pursuing a theory. In all I asked over 14 people this question. It is my opinion that income levels have a lot to do with who gets the blue slip. In my non scientific survey people with income levels below 40,000 ALL got blue slips and those above ALL were approved. Interesting if nothing else.

 

At about 2:10 a window opened and in typical China fashion everyone raced to it and formed a line. The Chinese lady behind the window handed out a form and a number. We were told to fill out the form and have a seat. At precisely 2:30 three more windows opened. They started calling out the numbers but in a random order. I waited about 35 minutes and finally my number was called. I had got the VO that some have called the “biker dude” he smiled and was very friendly. I told him that I have not gotten this far yet in the process and that I was here to , hopefully, avoid the blue slip. I wanted to better understand this horrible process. I said that it seemed that cases were decided in the back room and that I had talked with many people in the last few days who had said that they didn’t even look at the evidence. He assured me that they only get the case minutes before the person is called to the window and they do look at the evidence. Then he said something that backs up my opinion about income. He said “ if a person has limited income it raises a red flag… “They can make 30 or 40 thousand dollars for bringing someone to the US”. He said “ you would be amazed at how many cases of fraud that there are in China” I disagreed and said that I felt most cases were legit. He said that he had worked in the fraud department and that there were many cases of fraud. I told him that I belonged to a internet group CFL he said that he was familiar with it. I said that we had seen a brief decrease in the processing times but that recently it seemed to have hit a bottleneck again. He said that they were working Saturdays and trying to process the cases as fast as possible. I asked if there were any plans to increase the staff at Guz. He said there were no plans to increase the staff and that the process was “as fast as it was going to be”. I asked Paula’s question about changing status on entry into US when the marriage has been over 2 years. He said that status could not be changed automatically … that a “filling to change status” would be necessary. As I said before he was friendly and made every effort to answer my questions. I don’t think that “finances” is the only factor in case decision … However I believe that those with income levels below 40,000 have a harder row to hoe…. And evidence of a “family relationship” needs to be very strong.

 

Of the 6 guys that were there with blue slips in hand…. Not one was “overcome” at that meeting.