Had my interview today, wasn't approved because of a pending name check..
Summary of my experience:
1. Arrived 15 minutes before my interview time. There is a lot of parking over there. Met my attorney outside the building.
Got called in for interview on my wife's time slot, which was 30 minutes after mine. There are some toys in the waiting room for younger children.
2. The officer looked through my case file, and quickly found that my name check did not complete. It was then obvious that I wouldn't get approved on the spot. My wife's name check did go through, but without my approval, it didn't do her any good.
3. We were asked a few questions (both of us together) from the I-485 list, like have we ever been a member of the communist party, ever been on J visa, ever falsified information to get a visa, etc.
4. They tried understanding why the case got turned over for an interview, and there was a note to check my previous employment, at which point my attorney filled in the information from the I-140 filing, about the job requirement and my letters from previous employers.
5. They verified a few things from my form, like DOB, country of residence before the US. She wrote down the info from my drivers license.
6. She then turned to my wife, had her verify her FOB and country of residence before the US. My wife made a mistake when asked for our date of marriage (I thought it was only the men that forget theat date
) which raised an eyebrow. We were then asked for some documentation with both our names on it( didn't specify exactly what they wanted), at which point I produced a PG&E bill and a car insurance policy. We were also asked for a copy of our kids' birth certificate, which pretty much ensured them that the marriage was bona-fide.
7. We received a couple of forms that said we had gone through the interview and were in pending status.
That was basically it. We discussed what the name check would entail, and how long we would have to wait (unknown). It took around 40 minutes. The officer did ask in the end if we were going to celebrate, so I guess it's a good sign. Now to keep playing the waiting game with the FBI name check. We're getting pretty good at that game...