Hello:
I am done today with the whole process, so I wanted to thank all for the info in this board. It was extremely useful.
In case my experience helps anyone, here it is:
I mailed the N-400 on 10/01/2007 to Vermont via regular mail. The application was caught in the backlog and I kept checking their site to see when they will come to it.
The check was cashed on 11/28/2007 and I got a Receipt dated 12/10/2007 with both, the "Received Date" and "Priority Date", set as 10/01/2007.
Since the Receipt included the statement: "You should expect to be notified within 365 days of this notice," and given all the comments in the press about the backlog, I thought that I would not hear anything else for another year and went to spend New Years eve to my native country. When I came back around the middle of January, I found on the mail a Fingerprint Notification dated 01/03/2008 instructing me to be there on 01/26/2008. I did so and the whole thing took 10 minutes from entering to exiting.
Once again, I thought that it would take a while to hear from them, but by 03/26/2008 I got a notice for the Interview on 05/22/2008 at 9:00 AM.
I went there (Newark, NJ), today and arrived at around 8:45 am. The place was already packed with hundreds of people. It stayed like that until I left. At some points there were not enough chairs for all waiting. IO's kept calling and calling people in. I was called in at about 10:30 or so. A wait of about 2 hours and 1:30 after my appointment. The IO was extremely nice. He let me in, read through my file, made a couple of jokes. I told him that I had two more trips out of the US since I submitted the N-400 and that I had a couple of typos and he did not care since it did not really made a difference. I mentioned that I forgot to include the Union I am a member of (collective bargaining), and he added it and that was it. I wrote the sentence "I live in New Jersey", signed writing all my names in a few places and was done in about 5 minutes or so. He even said that I worry too much, since I had a lot of papers, tax returns and other documents that I did not need at all. I was given a piece of paper saying that I passed and another saying that the Oath would take place at 12:00 p.m. I waited to be called to sign the certificate until about 1:20 p.m. or so, that is, another couple of hours and the ceremony started at around 1:30 p.m. They were having a ceremony about once an hour or so after 11:00 am. At the ceremony someone that already looked quite tired told us about the certificate, how to get a copy if we needed one, about applying for a Passport and registering to vote. Then, she directed us while we recited the Oath and the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag. Then, we saw a video with George W. Bush congratulating us and talking about what it means to be a citizen and then something like a video clip about the US. After that, we were called, got out certificates, forms to apply for a passport, a voting registration form and a letter from the President, and I left at around 2:06 p.m.
The whole experience took about 5 hours and a half. The lady apologized several times for the delay. She said that they understood that we would be really tired at that point but they were one of the few facilities where the interview and Oath ceremony are done the same day and it was better that way because otherwise they would have to check again that one was nor arrested, etc, after the interview.
All in all, it was a long day but it is nice to have all completed and over with.
So, the whole process, from beginning to end lasted about 7 month, from October 1st, that I mailed the application, until today, or about 5 months from the time they actually opened the envelope. It was a lot faster in all aspects than what I expected based on the reports I read everywhere, including the New York Times, regarding the backlog, etc.
Thanks again for all the info I got in this board. It was very useful and reassuring.
I am done today with the whole process, so I wanted to thank all for the info in this board. It was extremely useful.
In case my experience helps anyone, here it is:
I mailed the N-400 on 10/01/2007 to Vermont via regular mail. The application was caught in the backlog and I kept checking their site to see when they will come to it.
The check was cashed on 11/28/2007 and I got a Receipt dated 12/10/2007 with both, the "Received Date" and "Priority Date", set as 10/01/2007.
Since the Receipt included the statement: "You should expect to be notified within 365 days of this notice," and given all the comments in the press about the backlog, I thought that I would not hear anything else for another year and went to spend New Years eve to my native country. When I came back around the middle of January, I found on the mail a Fingerprint Notification dated 01/03/2008 instructing me to be there on 01/26/2008. I did so and the whole thing took 10 minutes from entering to exiting.
Once again, I thought that it would take a while to hear from them, but by 03/26/2008 I got a notice for the Interview on 05/22/2008 at 9:00 AM.
I went there (Newark, NJ), today and arrived at around 8:45 am. The place was already packed with hundreds of people. It stayed like that until I left. At some points there were not enough chairs for all waiting. IO's kept calling and calling people in. I was called in at about 10:30 or so. A wait of about 2 hours and 1:30 after my appointment. The IO was extremely nice. He let me in, read through my file, made a couple of jokes. I told him that I had two more trips out of the US since I submitted the N-400 and that I had a couple of typos and he did not care since it did not really made a difference. I mentioned that I forgot to include the Union I am a member of (collective bargaining), and he added it and that was it. I wrote the sentence "I live in New Jersey", signed writing all my names in a few places and was done in about 5 minutes or so. He even said that I worry too much, since I had a lot of papers, tax returns and other documents that I did not need at all. I was given a piece of paper saying that I passed and another saying that the Oath would take place at 12:00 p.m. I waited to be called to sign the certificate until about 1:20 p.m. or so, that is, another couple of hours and the ceremony started at around 1:30 p.m. They were having a ceremony about once an hour or so after 11:00 am. At the ceremony someone that already looked quite tired told us about the certificate, how to get a copy if we needed one, about applying for a Passport and registering to vote. Then, she directed us while we recited the Oath and the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag. Then, we saw a video with George W. Bush congratulating us and talking about what it means to be a citizen and then something like a video clip about the US. After that, we were called, got out certificates, forms to apply for a passport, a voting registration form and a letter from the President, and I left at around 2:06 p.m.
The whole experience took about 5 hours and a half. The lady apologized several times for the delay. She said that they understood that we would be really tired at that point but they were one of the few facilities where the interview and Oath ceremony are done the same day and it was better that way because otherwise they would have to check again that one was nor arrested, etc, after the interview.
All in all, it was a long day but it is nice to have all completed and over with.
So, the whole process, from beginning to end lasted about 7 month, from October 1st, that I mailed the application, until today, or about 5 months from the time they actually opened the envelope. It was a lot faster in all aspects than what I expected based on the reports I read everywhere, including the New York Times, regarding the backlog, etc.
Thanks again for all the info I got in this board. It was very useful and reassuring.
