Major N-400 Screwup

[yave20b]

Well, after flawlessly filling out of the endless numbers of forms since I met my wife in China in 2004 to get her through the 10 year green card, I finally screwed up.

 

I studied the N-400 the past week along with the instructions, filled it out, and mailed it in today with my $675. Then I came to CFL to look around and discovered I had failed to read ALL of the "Guide to Naturalization", especially page 48, "Document Checklist". I thought it was too easy just sending in the form with nothing else, but I was in a hurry. So now my wife's N-400 is on its way to the USCIS without any of the endless volumes of required documents.

 

No doubt they will fail it and return it to me who knows when. But it would have been nice if they had included all the required documents in the N-400ins, which they do with the instructions that come with all other forms. Just when I thought I was seeing the light at the end of this long nightmarish immigration tunnel, it turns out to be another oncoming train. When will it end?

Edited November 27, 2008 by yave20b (see edit history)

[Trigg]

Well, after flawlessly filling out of the endless numbers of forms since I met my wife in China in 2004 to get her through the 10 year green card, I finally screwed up.

 

I studied the N-400 the past week along with the instructions, filled it out, and mailed it in today with my $675. Then I came to CFL to look around and discovered I had failed to read ALL of the "Guide to Naturalization", especially page 48, "Document Checklist". I thought it was too easy just sending in the form with nothing else, but I was in a hurry. So now my wife's N-400 is on its way to the USCIS without any of the endless volumes of required documents.

 

No doubt they will fail it and return it to me who knows when. But it would have been nice if they had included all the required documents in the N-400ins, which they do with the instructions that come with all other forms. Just when I thought I was seeing the light at the end of this long nightmarish immigration tunnel, it turns out to be another oncoming train. When will it end?

I did the same thing. They processed it, sent us a biometrics appointment and now we are waiting for the RFE. No big deal!

[dnoblett]

Yep they may do one of 2 things,

• Return the package requesting evidence
  
• OR keep the package and RFE
  

[C4Racer]

That's the problem with their new forms. They have the form in one PDF and the instructions in another. Easy to miss. Wonder if they have more mistakes now.

 

I bet they just RFE you for more info. The form shows why she's eligible, they'll just want to see the proof.

[dnoblett]

That's the problem with their new forms. They have the form in one PDF and the instructions in another. Easy to miss. Wonder if they have more mistakes now.

 

I bet they just RFE you for more info. The form shows why she's eligible, they'll just want to see the proof.

N-400 download page also has a link to another page with the checklist.

 

http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/men...00048f3d6a1RCRD

[yave20b]

Well, we tracked the package and it was delivered to the service center exactly 1 week ago today. And today we show they cashed our check for $675. So I guess they aren't going to fail it outright. Maybe they'll just send us an RFE later for all that stuff I didn't send.

 

But here's a strange one. Last week my wife's Chinese friend came over for dinner. She's married to an American guy and she just got her citizenship in November. She told us her husband sent in only the N-400 and nothing else. They never did an RFE for anything. She did her biometrics and got her interview letter. And when she went for her interview she took along her original papers (marriage license, bank stuff, etc) but they never asked to see it. She said they had her file in front of them and it was about 2 inches thick so she thinks they had all the stuff they had on her from her fiancee visa, 2 year GC, and 10 year GC.

[dnoblett]

Well, we tracked the package and it was delivered to the service center exactly 1 week ago today. And today we show they cashed our check for $675. So I guess they aren't going to fail it outright. Maybe they'll just send us an RFE later for all that stuff I didn't send.

 

But here's a strange one. Last week my wife's Chinese friend came over for dinner. She's married to an American guy and she just got her citizenship in November. She told us her husband sent in only the N-400 and nothing else. They never did an RFE for anything. She did her biometrics and got her interview letter. And when she went for her interview she took along her original papers (marriage license, bank stuff, etc) but they never asked to see it. She said they had her file in front of them and it was about 2 inches thick so she thinks they had all the stuff they had on her from her fiancee visa, 2 year GC, and 10 year GC.

Sounds like the adjudicator in her case was not ANAL.

[yave20b]

Here's an update on our situation since I sent in my wife's N-400 without any of the required documents. We received her appointment letter about 3 weeks ago for her interview and exam. She will have her interview and exam this week.

 

In the appointment letter we got, they asked us to essentially bring those documents, that we were supposed to have sent in with our N-400, to her interview. We've never received any other letter from them regarding the missing documents. And oddly, we never got an appointment letter for her biometric stuff.

 

My wife's been studying for the exam since last summer. And I'll be doing mock interviews with her this weekend to get her prepared.

[yave20b]

She Finally passed. We went to her interview, which was early in the morning. Her interviewer came out and introduced himself to both me and my wife, told me he would bring her back in about 30 minutes, and left. Exactly 30 minutes later they came back, she had a big smile on her face, and he congratulated me was well.

 

My wife said he was very, very nice. She said he told her not to be nervous as he took her to the interview room. He checked out her green card, made a photocopy of it, and then chatted with her for a few minutes about general things not related to immigration.

 

Because of our application date, my wife had to take the new test, she did not have the option of choosing between the old or new. Then he gave her a sentence to read...she can't remember what it was but said she had no trouble. He gave her one sentence to write, which she also couldn't remember also..but she passed. She did say both the reading and writing test came from the words that are listed in the English Test at the end of the study guide at Study Guide. As for the civcs and history test, he asked her 10 of the questions that came from the new study guide and she got all 10 correct.

 

Now the odd thing is that we forgot to send in any of the required documents when we sent in our N-400. We never got a RFE for an any of them. So I put together copies of all those necessary documents in a notebook, and also had another notebook with the originals in them, which my wife took into the interview with her. She told him she had all those things with her but he said he didn't want to see them. The only thing he wanted were the two passport photos which we brought with us.

 

We've already received her oath ceremony letter and she will do her oath in 3 weeks. What a long trip this has been. Both of us are so happy its finally over.

Edited March 1, 2009 by yave20b (see edit history)

[georgeandli]

Always good to read of a happy ending. Congrats!

[MikeXiao]

Good News!! Another Citizen On the Way!!!!!!!!!!