Derivative Green card received Primary applicant still pending 3 months later

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shockabsorber7

Registered Users (C)
My spouse has an employment based green card application filed. Our date became current in December 2013. We filed our I-485 and received our EAD and AP card in January 2014. In March 2014, my actual green card showed up in the mail while my spouse (the primary applicant) is still waiting as of June 2014. When we inquired about the delay with the company lawyer, we were told that the dates for EB3 ROW have retrogressed and that is why my spouse's card is delayed.
Isn't my application tied to my spouse's and if so, how did I get my card before my spouse's was even approved? My spouse went to the local USCIS office to inquire further but they didn't seem to know much about what was going on besides what we can see for ourselves on the USCIS Case status website.
 
Also, when my spouse inquired with the company lawyer a month after I received my green card, we were told that the primary application was also approved but not updated in the system and to allow USCIS 60 days to issue the card. But now, 60 days later, we are being told that the dates have retrogressed and we will have to keep waiting.
 
That's good news. They must have approved him on the books back in March but were late with printing his physical card.
 
Update: I thought the saga was over, but apparently not
We received a notice in the mail saying that USCIS wants to revoke my green card since it was issued "in error".
Our lawyer advised we do as we were told and send my green card back to USCIS ...and so I did...with great difficulty, hesitation and trepidation. When our lawyer contacted them, USCIS claims they will fix their mistake and send me a new card in two weeks - which remains to be seen.
On further probing, we found out my spouse's application (main application) was only approved in July 2014 and they sent the card in August 2014 while mine (derivative application) was approved and sent to me in March 2014 - before my spouse's application was even approved. We had tried to clear it up with our lawyer back then, but the details were spotty and no one knew what to do in such a case...this happens quite rarely from what we have been told.
Since there isn't any other posting like this I could find after extensively searching the internet, I figured I'd put it up here in case it will be of help to others. I will post an update once this green card nightmare of mine is finally put to rest.
 
USCIS made mistakes sometimes.
Years ago, my friend filed I-539 correctly, but got a letter from USCIS saying she didn't pay the application fee. But the bank record said it was cashed. So she went to the bank, got the check copy showing USCIS had cashed it. She tried so hard to correct the mistake, calling USCIS again and again, writing letters to USCIS....
And another friend got her I-612 approved, but a week later, received a letter from USCIS, saying she didn't pay the fee....
 
Thanks for the feedback Lucy. I hope the cases you mentioned had a favorable outcome.
I'm going to wait one more week before I get my lawyer and our senator's office to check on the status of my case.
It seems extremely unfair to leave me indefinitely in a state of limbo for an error on their part - especially when we have tried very hard all this while to make sure our i's are dotted and our t's are crossed.
To make matters worse, my EAD card will be expiring soon, which means I cannot continue working unless I get my green card soon.
 
shockabsorber7 said:
Thanks for the feedback Lucy. I hope the cases you mentioned had a favorable outcome.
I'm going to wait one more week before I get my lawyer and our senator's office to check on the status of my case.
It seems extremely unfair to leave me indefinitely in a state of limbo for an error on their part - especially when we have tried very hard all this while to make sure our i's are dotted and our t's are crossed.
To make matters worse, my EAD card will be expiring soon, which means I cannot continue working unless I get my green card soon.
Click to expand...
Senator will be helpful.
Try to get your EAD card renewed.
 
shockabsorber7 said:
Thanks for the feedback Lucy. I hope the cases you mentioned had a favorable outcome.
I'm going to wait one more week before I get my lawyer and our senator's office to check on the status of my case.
It seems extremely unfair to leave me indefinitely in a state of limbo for an error on their part - especially when we have tried very hard all this while to make sure our i's are dotted and our t's are crossed.
To make matters worse, my EAD card will be expiring soon, which means I cannot continue working unless I get my green card soon.
Click to expand...
I assume you have already showed your green card to your employer for the I-9 before having to surrender the green card, so your employer should not be asking you to fill out another I-9, unless you told them about your green card debacle.

So just keep quiet and continue working until you have the new EAD. Even if that means you have a gap of a few weeks between the expiration of the existing one and approval of the new one, as an employment-based adjustment of status applicant you are normally entitled to have up to 180 days of out-of-status forgiven.
 
Just wanted to update everyone on what happened in case it is helpful to someone out there.

My lawyer got the Senator's office involved since the mistake was clearly USCIS's.

The Senator's office asked that a new and corrected card be sent to me asap, but USCIS refused to do so unless I returned my original card that was issued in error.
I sent it to my lawyer who sent it via FedEx to them. Unsurprisingly, they claimed they never received my card and even when we gave them the FedEx delivery proof, they claimed they "misplaced" it. This went on for a month or so while they hunted for my card, but the Senator's office was very good about getting updates from USCIS and keeping them accountable.
After the case was escalated to the USCIS Regional Director and the DC Office by the Senator's office, they agreed to process my new card without being able to track down the old one, but they claimed that my medicals had gone past the 1 year limit and they needed me to redo them. If they had not "misplaced" my returned green card, the medicals would have still been valid.

I did my medicals again and sent it out. This time, they processed everything very quickly and send me my new card within a week. I'm guessing they had to be efficient in this case due to all the visibility this was getting.
The whole process lasted about 3 months from the time I received the letter with intent to revoke until I got my new card which I received just 1 week before my EAD was due to expire. The Senator's office was extremely helpful in pushing things through. If they were not involved, I'm sure that this would have taken several months or even years to get resolved!
 
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