jeffzhang8716

Just confirmed with the Costa Rico embassy in Beijing. Case like me can not enter Costa Rico visa free. If you are on permanent residency status, you need the physical green card and must be valid at least 6 months. Seems like I'll lost my non refundable ticket. Should double check the details before book it. If you have US tourist visa you can enter visa free, but mine is not valid any more. If you have multiple Schengen visa, which I just applied you can enter visa free. But they just eliminated the Schengen visa policy in the early of this year. Really bad luck. Anyway, thanks for all the info!! Need to get ready and prepared for the next chapter of my life

This is what immigrant visa looks like: Note, the line near the bottom saying "Upon Endorsement" this means upon entry to the USA the POE officer endorses the visa at which point it shall serve as a temp green card (I-551) for one year. This notation is not valid before arriving in the states only after, endorsement is the key factor. Also not all countries POE officers are aware, understand, or recognize that the I-551 notation with endorsement = green-card, they may require an actual green-card or visit visa. Got it. I might can get a endorsement when I transit at Florida. I can just hand off all my immigrant documents there and get a endorsement. Maybe I can ask the officer there then decide whether to catch the later flight to Costa Rico or not. If they say I'll be okay or can get some paper documents to prove that or show to the officers in Costa Rico, that would be the best. The worst case is I have to fly back to US if I can't enter Costa Rico. Which means I can't book anything more before actually enter the country. This visa thing is driving me crazy. Thanks for the info!!! I really appreciate your help and patience.

Thank you guys!!! Really appreciate it. I do have another irrelevant question. Can I ask it here or should I make another post. I looked the Costa Rica visa policies. It says if you have U.S. tourist visa or green card if you can enter Costa Rico without visa. I used to have tourist visa but now I only have the immigration visa. I saw some post says that this visa equals green card before you receive it. Like you can go to Canada just with this visa. There is a sentence in the visa as well, something like I-what(don't remember the number) form for one year temporarily(I'm having my passport for the Schengen visa so won't have time to make another Costa Rico visa before my flight and I already booked all the flights) But I saw something more specifically today, like they request you have the actual green card with you for entering the country. Anyone has similar experience? Can Chinese passport with a immigration visa but haven't entered U.S. or get the green card yet enter Costa Rico visa free? Any information would be greatly appreciated. The visa thing for travel literally drove me crazy for the past week

I am not sure if I requested the Social Security Number during the DS-260 form. There is a instruction says that if you didn't you should take care of it by yourself. How long does it usually take? Only after that I can create a bank account and start to work right?

Simply TRY to register - don't worry about getting drafted, https://www.uscis.gov/policymanual/HTML/PolicyManual-Volume12-PartD-Chapter7.html Thank you so much Randy. Does that mean I should register online now? I don't need to mail anything later when I get to US? I'll pay the fee for the green card asap as well. Anyway, seems like it's much easier to just register but my wife is very paranoid about this draft thing

First of all, thanks for all the help this form. Since I got my passport back I'd like to share some reminders first for the interview. The interview went pretty well, but we encountered some problems that caused 3 weeks delay. First problem is, for join sponsor tax problem. My wife's dad filed a joint tax for his family, even if her mom doesn't work she still need to fill I-834A form. I didn't prepare that one before the interview and the officer asked me to mail the stuff they need to them. Then comes with the second problem, I mailed through CITIC bank I thought this time I don't need to attach a cover letter so I wrote all my info on the envelope, then my package got bounced back after a week. I knew during the last step you have to attach a pre interview cover letter for mailing the documents cuz there is instructions in the mail but this time they didn't tell me. I felt weird wrote my info on the envelope when I mailed the stuff. However I didn't double check on their website. There is another cover letter that used for mailing additional documents after the interview. That's the two problems that people might have as well for their interview as well. Ok now I have several questions about my situation that I would like people who know this situation can help me out. Basically for immigration under 26 they need to register for the military thing. I'm 25 now and will be 26 at Dec this year. My wife and I are going for a really long vocation at Europe and Costa Rico. The problem is I will transit in US when fly to Costa Rico from Spain 4 or 5 days before my 26 birthday. I know for US even if you transit you still need to process the immigration stuff. Does that mean I should hand off all my immigration stuff to the officer at that time? Or I should do after my Costa Rico trip back to US officially? Do I need to register for the military thing if I transit 4 days before my 26? How does that 26 count? The time you you got your immigration visa? The time you get your green card? The time you transit in US? The time you 'official' enter US? I've heard if you forgot to register or you trying to avoid register will have some problems when you do naturalization. But at the same time my wife is kinda scared of this military thing. She doesn't want me to involve any kind war. How does this thing exactly work? Also should I pay the green card fee right now or when I get to US? There is another Social Security Card problem that I need to take care later. Seems like there is a lot of stuff need to be take care of after the interview Thank you all Jeff

So would my husband then need to file form i864 a if he is the intending immigrant?

I mean similar or higher incomes

We are both living in China and neither of our incomes will continue in the US, though we will probably find other jobs with similar incomes as jobs tend to be higher-paying in the US. I figured that if my income wont count on form i864, I don't see why I shouldn't include my husband's income along with it.

Hi everyone, I'm petitioning my husband for a spousal greencard and I was wondering if I could include my husband in my household income on form i864, and whether he would have to file form i864 a if I did that. My income alone isn't above the poverty threshold but our combined incomes are. I am planning to use a joint sponsor as well but thought it would make sense to include my husband's income since he is officially part of my household. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you! Allie

Hi All, The US spouse doesn't need to attend the interview right? My wife probably will be on her vocation at that time. Just need to double check about that before she finally book the tickets. So only the applicant need to show up there with all the documents. I don't need her passport and she doesn't need to be there right? Another question is I won't need to pay the fee during the interview if I pay on the cgi website right? Thanks, Jeff

I called them and they said they have a ds-160 confirmation no field because I applied for non-immigrant visa before so the that field is there automatically. They helped me deleted the field now everything is okay now. On the final confirmation letter there shouldn't be a ds-160 confirmation no field. Also for customer service representative you need to listen to the whole self-helped voice message and then you can press 5 to forward to the customer service representative. Hope the people have same situation can have a clue how to deal with that now

It's not clear from what you're saying if you actually have a DIFFERENT confirmation number for the DS-260. Are you able to schedule an interview? If not, USTravelDocs - Contact Us No, I'm not at the interview schedule part yet. The consular sent me a email to submit the ds260 online, which I did and get a confirmation page. It has a confirmation number on it. Then I need to mail the ds260 confirmation page, the passport personal page, the visa photos and the submission letter. Then you need to go to CGI website to register for yourself. I had a account before cuz I applied for tourists visa before. Then I updated my contact info and delivery address stuff cuz I live in different city now. Then I select New Application/Schedule appointment, choose immigrant visa scheduled by NVC only, next next next to the final page, which says Your Transaction Is Complete Please click "Printable Version", print the confirmation, and bring it with you to your interview. Basically the form is like Applicant Name: Passport Number: UID: U.S. Consulate General: GUANGZHOU (广州) Trip Purpose: Registration Visa Class: CR1 Document Delivery Type: Pick Up Location Name: 上海-打浦桥 Shanghai - Da Pu Qiao Address 1: 瑞金南路1号海兴广场1楼(1F,Haixing Plaza,No.1 South Ruijin Rd) Address 2: City: 黄埔 Huangpu State: Shanghai 上海 Postal Code: 200023 DS-160 Confirmation Number: As you can see in the last field is DS-160 confirmation number, which I think is the old one I used to tourists visa. I got a different ds-260 confirmation no after submitted the ds-260 online. This field makes me confused. And the website says Attention: You will NOT be allowed to attend your visa interview and we cannot process your visa application if your DS-160 barcode number is different from the number on your Appointment Confirmation letter. This will cause delay in applying for and receiving your visa. To avoid delay, please ensure the following: 1: Make sure the DS-160 barcode number matches the barcode number in your UStraveldocs profile and on your Appointment Confirmation letter. 2: If you applied for a U.S. visa previously, please update your current DS-160 barcode number in your UStraveldocs profile. 3: We suggest you copy/paste the DS-160 barcode number from the electronic PDF version you received by email. 4: Pay attention to similar characters such as 0 vs. O, 1 vs. I, S vs. 8, B vs. 8 when creating your profile. I'm not that sure about that field is right or not so I didn't mailed the documents to the Guangzhou Consular yet. After they received my documents and review them, then they will ask me to schedule the interview so I'm not at that part yet. Don't know if explained clearly or not Thanks Jeff Maybe I'm still not understanding your situation, but 1, 2 and 3 here seem to tell you what to do. If not, hopefully someone more familiar with this stage can help. Make sure that you are entering information for an IMMIGRANT visa (e.g., DS-260, instead of DS-160). Seems like I've heard of others having problems with the USTravelDocs website applying for an Immigrant visa after having previously gotten a non-immigrant visa, so perhaps a call to their help desk is in order. I selected the immigrant visa scheduled by NVC only, if I select immigrant visa then it says my case id can't be found. Yeah I find some people have similar problem online but nobody knows. It shouldn't have a ds-160 confirmation code in the confirmation letter, but maybe because I applied a non-immigrant visa before using that account. I'll give them a call and see what they will say. By the way I tried called the shanghai hotline on weekends and there is no option for customer service representative only self-helped indicating voice message. Maybe because it's on weekends? I'll call again later. Thanks for your help Randy!! Jeff

It's not clear from what you're saying if you actually have a DIFFERENT confirmation number for the DS-260. Are you able to schedule an interview? If not, USTravelDocs - Contact Us No, I'm not at the interview schedule part yet. The consular sent me a email to submit the ds260 online, which I did and get a confirmation page. It has a confirmation number on it. Then I need to mail the ds260 confirmation page, the passport personal page, the visa photos and the submission letter. Then you need to go to CGI website to register for yourself. I had a account before cuz I applied for tourists visa before. Then I updated my contact info and delivery address stuff cuz I live in different city now. Then I select New Application/Schedule appointment, choose immigrant visa scheduled by NVC only, next next next to the final page, which says Your Transaction Is Complete Please click "Printable Version", print the confirmation, and bring it with you to your interview. Basically the form is like Applicant Name: Passport Number: UID: U.S. Consulate General: GUANGZHOU (广州) Trip Purpose: Registration Visa Class: CR1 Document Delivery Type: Pick Up Location Name: 上海-打浦桥 Shanghai - Da Pu Qiao Address 1: 瑞金南路1号海兴广场1楼(1F,Haixing Plaza,No.1 South Ruijin Rd) Address 2: City: 黄埔 Huangpu State: Shanghai 上海 Postal Code: 200023 DS-160 Confirmation Number: As you can see in the last field is DS-160 confirmation number, which I think is the old one I used to tourists visa. I got a different ds-260 confirmation no after submitted the ds-260 online. This field makes me confused. And the website says Attention: You will NOT be allowed to attend your visa interview and we cannot process your visa application if your DS-160 barcode number is different from the number on your Appointment Confirmation letter. This will cause delay in applying for and receiving your visa. To avoid delay, please ensure the following: 1: Make sure the DS-160 barcode number matches the barcode number in your UStraveldocs profile and on your Appointment Confirmation letter. 2: If you applied for a U.S. visa previously, please update your current DS-160 barcode number in your UStraveldocs profile. 3: We suggest you copy/paste the DS-160 barcode number from the electronic PDF version you received by email. 4: Pay attention to similar characters such as 0 vs. O, 1 vs. I, S vs. 8, B vs. 8 when creating your profile. I'm not that sure about that field is right or not so I didn't mailed the documents to the Guangzhou Consular yet. After they received my documents and review them, then they will ask me to schedule the interview so I'm not at that part yet. Don't know if explained clearly or not Thanks Jeff

Hello, I submitted the DS-260 online and get the confirmation code. Then I registered myself on the cgi website for contact info and pick up location stuff. I applied the tourist's visa before so I updated some of the info. After filled everything I got the confirmation letter but it's still the ds-160 confirmation no. I think that's my tourist's visa confirmation no. for the interview last time. Should it be the ds-260 confirmation no. cuz I submitted the ds-260 form? I have no idea how to update that one or it doesn't matter? The site says you won't get a interview appointment notice if the confirmation no. is not the same. Anyone knows this issue? How can I solve this problem. Thanks in advance!! Jeff