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DV 2019 Oceania Selectees

Bob22 said:
Question re banks: I was originally going to wait until I get to Austin to go for a bank account but now it seems I'm already picking up a pretty busy schedule literally the day I'm arriving there. Would it be weird to try and open a bank account in LA since we're there for a few days just relaxing.
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It wouldn't be weird, they wouldn't mind if you can swing the lack of SSN. I got a bank account in Salt Lake City with Wells Fargo pretty much immediately. The problem was that there is little to no Wells Fargo in Chicago where I moved to, so I had to change it and switch to chase.

Moral of the story is choose a bank in LA which also has a lot of branches / atms in Austin so you don't need to change again when you get there.
 
For those of you who have made the jump across the pond. How long did you have to pay high premiums for car insurance before you saw it start to fall? At the moment it’s looking like coming in at around $250 per month.
 
Mijoro said:
For those of you who have made the jump across the pond. How long did you have to pay high premiums for car insurance before you saw it start to fall? At the moment it’s looking like coming in at around $250 per month.
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Shop around with insurers, though of course it is also car and area dependent. We managed to get good rates right from the start, because we found one who would take our previous no-claim history and gave discounts to people with college degrees...but most people see the fall after they get their US licenses. You should be able to get significantly lower than that in due course. That rate is similar to heavily loaded brand new teenage driver rate where we are.
 
Yeah I think in Nevada I’d be considered a 16 year old driver. I’m looking at programs like snapshot by progressive to try and drop down the cost.
 
I was lucky enough that my boyfriends parents are letting me use one of their cars. I know they put me on the insurance and I think they said it cost $100 a month. Given I'm just an "add-on" I'm not sure how it would compare.
 
We're in California now. In North Hollywood, will take the kids to the zoo and universal studios in the next couple of days. Then off to Austin for the serious stuff.

No problems with immigration, although the queue was huge so it was a hefty wait but no big deal.

Picked up a bit of a dodgy belly in the last couple of days, so that made the 12 hr flight from Auckland to LA...long. Oh so very very long.
 
Bob the Warner brothers tour is a good one as well.

So happy to hear you made it thru ok and managed not to have an accident while waiting :D

Did you still have to go to those pop up scanners when you arrived or did you just go straight to another line?
 
They put me in a non us citizen with visa line. Took about an hour to see someone and then 20 mins for the official to do the four of us.
 
Mijoro said:
What happens to your luggage during that time of your delayed coming thru immigration?
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I think that depends on the airport. For us, we got stuck in secondary for nearly 2 hours behind 2 security related issues... when we finally got out, we discovered one of the CBP guys had gone to fetch our luggage off the belt and had it waiting for us as we left secondary. But you always see uncollected baggage at the side of the baggage halls so I guess that’s where most of it ends up.
 
Hi everyone. Congrats to all successful applicants and well done on being more organised than us. My wife (principal applicant) and I have just been issued our interview date for mid Aug in Sydney office. We’re based in Melbourne and our initial intention was to do an activation trip to either Hawaii or Vegas/Cali in late Sept before returning permanently in March.

Question: will we still need to enter US soil to activate visa before 30 Sept 2019 or following the interview do they provide you with a temp visa with an extended expiry date? Eg 6 months from interview date - which for us would be mid Feb therefore we would flag an activation trip. Thanks for your help.
 
Hi everyone. Newbie here. Just checked ESC site and I've received my 2NL! Scheduled for mid August interview in Sydney too.

Question - Has anyone seen cases whereby the 2NL showing all the children in the family ( being included as "beneficiaries" in the 2NL now). However, it was clearly indicated in the DS 260 submitted which kid is not joining the DV 2019 process / migrating to US. The kid who's not joining has not submitted a DS 260 either. So just wonder if this is a normal procedure that they just indicate all the children in the 2NL? The 2NL shows 2 categories of names under Applicant and Beneficiaries. Many thanks !
 
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drjrice said:
Hi everyone. Congrats to all successful applicants and well done on being more organised than us. My wife (principal applicant) and I have just been issued our interview date for mid Aug in Sydney office. We’re based in Melbourne and our initial intention was to do an activation trip to either Hawaii or Vegas/Cali in late Sept before returning permanently in March.

Question: will we still need to enter US soil to activate visa before 30 Sept 2019 or following the interview do they provide you with a temp visa with an extended expiry date? Eg 6 months from interview date - which for us would be mid Feb therefore we would flag an activation trip. Thanks for your help.
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After the interview they put a sticker in your passport that states the expiry date for entry, which is 6 months after the medical you did. So don't do the medical too early. You need to enter before that date.
 
Mijoro said:
What happens to your luggage during that time of your delayed coming thru immigration?
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Ours was still going around the carosul, looking lonely and sad. But I did notice a stack of unclaimed luggage next to it so I suspect over time it would end up in that pile.

I got a bank acct today with the wife, so that is awesome. One less thing to do in Texas now. I already had a SSN from a previous time in the US so that probably helped a bit.
 
zanser said:
Hi everyone. Newbie here. Just checked ESC site and I've received my 2NL! Scheduled for mid August interview in Sydney too.

Question - Has anyone seen cases whereby the 2NL showing all the children in the family ( being included as "beneficiaries" in the 2NL now). However, it was clearly indicated in the DS 260 submitted which kid is not joining the DV 2019 process / migrating to US. The kid who's not joining has not submitted a DS 260 either. So just wonder if this is a normal procedure that they just indicate all the children in the 2NL? The 2NL shows 2 categories of names under Applicant and Beneficiaries. Many thanks !
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Normal. Nothing to worry about.
 
For SSN for the rest of my family, do they need to formally apply for one? I seem to recall at some point during the process for the DV visa there was some checkbox somewhere to say send out a SSN Card at the same time as the Greencard?

Also, I notice some people have mentioned they have checked on the status of their greencard processing (the actual card). Which website is that? Somewhere on USCIS?
 
Bob22 said:
For SSN for the rest of my family, do they need to formally apply for one? I seem to recall at some point during the process for the DV visa there was some checkbox somewhere to say send out a SSN Card at the same time as the Greencard?

Also, I notice some people have mentioned they have checked on the status of their greencard processing (the actual card). Which website is that? Somewhere on USCIS?
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There was a checkbox on the DS-260 that asked if you wanted an SSN to be provided

To check the status of your GC you need to create an account https://myaccount.uscis.dhs.gov/
 
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