Moving while N-400 application is in process

Yes, I agree.. I should have looked properly at the document. I did make copies of it, and also put a digital copy in my secure repository where I keep most scanned copies of everything.. Since the letter came from San Jose, I assumed that the appointment is in the same place, and amist all the unpacking, I just added a reminder to my calander, and tucked the original copy in my immigration file :-( No excuse for that for sure.

Hopefully things will turn alright. The San Jose office received the letter today, and Seattle office is scheduled to receive the letter on Thursday. I will wait for the case status to change, then schedule an infopass to verify everything in person with the San Jose DO.

Thanks again for the tips :)
 
You could do a great service to your fellow applicants and petitioners by bringing this issue to the attention of the right people.

The e-mail addresses to raise an issue such as this are shown below. The main message should be to the western region office at the 1st address with a cc to HQ at the 2nd. This sounds like a training issue but could be a computer system problem. My money is on human error.

WRO.CommunityRelations@dhs.gov

Public.Engagement@dhs.gov
 
You could do a great service to your fellow applicants and petitioners by bringing this issue to the attention of the right people.

The e-mail addresses to raise an issue such as this are shown below. The main message should be to the western region office at the 1st address with a cc to HQ at the 2nd. This sounds like a training issue but could be a computer system problem. My money is on human error.

WRO.CommunityRelations@dhs.gov

Public.Engagement@dhs.gov

Thanks BigJoe! I will definitely do this. Would this, by any chance, affect the case at all, or is it is a safe thing to do while the case is still pending?
 
No reply yet from USCIS..

No reply yet from USCIS on the case.. If I do not hear before Friday this week, I will setup an infopass appointment for Monday to talk to an officer, and also give the letter I mailed in person.
 
Thanks BigJoe! I will definitely do this. Would this, by any chance, affect the case at all, or is it is a safe thing to do while the case is still pending?

The only effect to your case might be speeding up the file transfer by forcing someone to look at it. Potential corrections in processing could also be a result. (Help the next person with this issue.)
 
The only effect to your case might be speeding up the file transfer by forcing someone to look at it. Potential corrections in processing could also be a result. (Help the next person with this issue.)

How does this email sound? Should I include USPS registered mail tracking numbers as well?


<Date>


Dear Sir/Madam,

This is regarding my Application for Naturalization (N-400) case # <case#>.

I applied for naturalization when I resided in the state of Washington, and my district office was Seattle, WA. On October 26, 2011, I moved to Sunnyvale, CA and wrote a formal letter to USCIS Seattle District Office to re-schedule my citizenship Interview (which was scheduled for November 2, 2011), and transfer my file to the San Jose district office. I also filed the AR-11 form to notify about my residence address change.

Unfortunately, the interview was re-scheduled for November 28, 2011 with the Seattle district office instead of San Jose district office. Since I was moving at the time, I did not notice this discrepancy until a day before my Interview. I visited the San Jose district office on November 28, 2011 to discuss this, and the person at the information desk suggested that I re-write another formal letter similar to the one I wrote previously. A few days after this, I received a letter from USCIS suggesting that I failed to appear for the scheduled interview.

I wanted to bring this situation to your notice since, as per the requirements, I had properly notified USCIS about the change of my residential address (through AR-11 as well as formal letter) and desire to move the case/file to San Jose, yet it resulted in the interview being rescheduled at the wrong location. I hope this will not negatively affect my application for naturalization, and my interview will be speedily re-scheduled at the San Jose district office.

Sincerely,
<wife's name>
<wife's A#>
<Residence Postal Address>
 
Not sure if it was the email, or just regular processing time.. but I received email notification that they have scheduled interview and mailed the letter. Crossing fingers that this time it is the right location!
Thanks again everyone for helping out :)


As a side, anyone in my situation, looking to move in the middle of N-400 process, I HIGHLY RECOMMEND keeping the same district office, and travelling there for the Interviews to avoid all the mess of re-scheduling. While the outcome in my case was a rare occurrence, it is a lot of stress if it does happen.
 
Not sure if it was the email, or just regular processing time.. but I received email notification that they have scheduled interview and mailed the letter. Crossing fingers that this time it is the right location!
Thanks again everyone for helping out :)


As a side, anyone in my situation, looking to move in the middle of N-400 process, I HIGHLY RECOMMEND keeping the same district office, and travelling there for the Interviews to avoid all the mess of re-scheduling. While the outcome in my case was a rare occurrence, it is a lot of stress if it does happen.

Keen to know whether they will schedule your interview before you complete 3months/ 90 days under new DO. What if you are called early, and the IO denies your application on this ground. Is there a way out.
 
Keen to know whether they will schedule your interview before you complete 3months/ 90 days under new DO. What if you are called early, and the IO denies your application on this ground. Is there a way out.

That is a possibility. I have scheduled an Infopass with the DO next Friday to discuss that. But from what I hear, this should not be a problem. They generally delay the oath to a later date, the Interview can be done before the 3 months waiting period completes.
 
That is a possibility. I have scheduled an Infopass with the DO next Friday to discuss that. But from what I hear, this should not be a problem. They generally delay the oath to a later date, the Interview can be done before the 3 months waiting period completes.

The requirement for 3 months in a jurisdiction is only a filing prerequisite. You did that already. That 3 months in a jurisdiction does not restart after a file transfer. Some USCIS officers get confused about this but it is NOT correct that this is a reason to delay approval. The only allowed delay would be if the full 3 or 5 years has not yet been completed at time of interview. Some USCIS officers are confused about that as well.
 
The requirement for 3 months in a jurisdiction is only a filing prerequisite. You did that already. That 3 months in a jurisdiction does not restart after a file transfer. Some USCIS officers get confused about this but it is NOT correct that this is a reason to delay approval. The only allowed delay would be if the full 3 or 5 years has not yet been completed at time of interview. Some USCIS officers are confused about that as well.

Somehow, I interpreted "In the case of such a transfer, the proceedings on the application shall continue as though the application had originally been filed in the district of the Service to which the application is transferred." to mean that since that since the case is being transferred to San Jose, it will be treated as if it was originally filed in San Jose, ergo - 3 months residency clause will apply.
But thanks for clarifying this :)
 
Finally !!

Just thought I will update the thread for the benefit of future readers.

My wife had her citizenship test today with the San Jose DO. Everything went fine - the officer asked her about a couple long trips, and inquired about her re-entry permit. Surprisingly, he also asked for proof of marriage (even though she was not applying based on marriage), and she provided marriage certificate and joint bank account statements. Then the officer moved to the yes/no questions, verified her changed address on the N-400, calculated that she has 5 continuous years of residence. For the English test, he asked her to read the phrase "Who lives in the whitehouse?", and asked her to write the answer "The President lives in the white house". He asked 6 civic test - she answered one wrong (apparently, the state senator I found from Google was incorrect.. The officer said he was the senator before the current one), so asked an additional question which she got write. She does not remember all the question, so sorry I could not post that here.

The officer asked why we moved from Seattle, whether we like it here in the bay area. He told my wife that her case would have processed much quicker had she waited for the interview to finish in Seattle before moving, but thats past now, and we are glad we are finally done (almost) :)

The officer said there are still some open positions for the 1/19 oath ceremony, and asked my wife if she can make it there - wifey obviously agreed, and he gave the appointment letter after asking her to wait another 10-15 minutes to print it.

Overall, very pleasant experience. Her interview went slightly long (25 minutes or so), but that was mainly because they wanted to go over her dates outside U.S. to ensure she had the continuous residency in the last 5 years. Another week, and she would be in Campbell taking her citizenship oath :)

Thanks again to BigJoe5 and everyone who helped out on this thread - I am glad we are over it now :)
 
USCIS had the transfer request, but the address on their record was still the old address

Thanks BigJoe. Here is the sequence of events:

- Original appointment: November 2, 2011 at Seattle
- Wrote Letter on October 4, 2011 stating that she is relocating to San Jose, and the case/file needs to be transferred there to re-schedule in San Jose. We also mentioned that we will file AR-11 once the move completes (since we cannot file before that). The letter is VERY clear in stating that we are relocating, and the case needs to be re-scheduled AND transferred to San Jose DO. They received the letter on October 6, 2011.
- On October 25, 2011 they mailed a letter with the re-scheduled Interview date to our new address in Sunnyvale. We received the letter on October 28, 2011.. but because of the move/unpacking/etc, I must have neglected to check everything. The letter was from the San Jose DO (i.e. the address at the bottom of I797 was the San Jose DO on Monterey Road in San Jose, CA), but it requested to appear in Seattle for interview on November 28, 2011 at 8am.
- Moved on October 26, 2011 and filed AR-11 same day and added the case # to that request. We received a confirmation letter in the mail on November 4, 2011 that the address has changed on file for the N-400 case number.
- We noticed on November 27, 2011 that the location is Seattle. Tried calling the 800 number, but they are closed on Sundays
- We reached the San Jose DO at 7:35am on November 28, 2011 and explained the situation to the lady at the info counter. She guided us as above.
- Reached home at ~9am, called the 800 number on the form, and the rep said the same thing as the lady at the counter
- Wrote up a formal letter explaining the entire timeline of events, with the enclosed documents I stated in the previous post. Mailed it certified via USPS on 11/28/11. The letter should reach them tomorrow as per USPS tracking data.

Please let me know if there is any other information you need..

Congratulations walletless!

I notice one thing though. San Jose DO sent the interview letter to you on 10/25, one day before you filed AR-11. You had requested the transfer of N-400 earlier, yes, on 10/04 (which they received on 10/06). But AR-11 was filed later, after 10/25.

Did your 10/04 letter (requesting transfer) give them the new address? When the new DO sent you the interview letter on 10/25, the address in their records were your old Seattle address. So they gave the interview for the location that accorded with the address in their records, which was not yet updated.

Maybe a lesson here is to file AR-11 without waiting for the actual move. But I realize you are saying that this may not be permitted.
 
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The delay does not appear too bad

The officer asked why we moved from Seattle, whether we like it here in the bay area. He told my wife that her case would have processed much quicker had she waited for the interview to finish in Seattle before moving, but thats past now, and we are glad we are finally done (almost) :)

I also notice the whole process was not that slow. You had a FP on 09/20, and had interview on 01/19 (within 4 months of FP). I think you did not give the application date, but assuming it was around 09/04, the whole process was 4.5 months upto the interview, and less than 5 months including the oath. And that's despite the technical problems. Not very bad at all.

(I am surprised though you could get the first interview for 11/02, within 1.5 months of finger printing.)
 
I also notice the whole process was not that slow. You had a FP on 09/20, and had interview on 01/19 (within 4 months of FP). I think you did not give the application date, but assuming it was around 09/04, the whole process was 4.5 months upto the interview, and less than 5 months including the oath. And that's despite the technical problems. Not very bad at all.

(I am surprised though you could get the first interview for 11/02, within 1.5 months of finger printing.)

PD was 8/17/11/. So yes, the entire process, start-to-finish, took 5 months - which is under the estimated 6 months guideline that USCIS gives. When we mailed in the application, we were expecting that it would finish around end-of-jan. so in that sense, we definitely don't feel too delayed. If it was in Seattle, we would have had the interview on 11/2 and Seattle generally administers same day oath unless they could not verify something about the candidate.. so compared to that, we ended up about 2.5 months late, but I think the processing timeline was generally reasonable despite the technicalities.

Btw, the fingerprint was scheduled for 9/20, but we managed to do walk-in fingerprint on 9/7.

Here is the full timeline, if anyone is interested:
http://www.trackitt.com/usa-immigration-trackers/discuss/n400/841
 
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Cx38st

Congratulations walletless!

I notice one thing though. San Jose DO sent the interview letter to you on 10/25, one day before you filed AR-11. You had requested the transfer of N-400 earlier, yes, on 10/04 (which they received on 10/06). But AR-11 was filed later, after 10/25.

Did your 10/04 letter (requesting transfer) give them the new address? When the new DO sent you the interview letter on 10/25, the address in their records were your old Seattle address. So they gave the interview for the location that accorded with the address in their records, which was not yet updated.

Maybe a lesson here is to file AR-11 without waiting for the actual move. But I realize you are saying that this may not be permitted.

Yes, the 10/4 letter had the new residence address and also requested to transfer the case to the San Jose DO. AR-11 was filed on 10/25 because we cannot file it until after the move (there is no way to tell on AR-11 that we are moving on a future date).
 
Submission of a change of address after filing will trigger a case transfer to the new jurisdiction. The actual file containing the N-400 is probably at NBC for pre-processing and she already has her ASC appt. and will not actually move until after the FP appt. There should be no appreciable change EXCEPT for local office processing time frame and probably really bad parking at the USCIS Office.

INA 335 INVESTIGATION OF APPLICANTS; EXAMINATIONS OF APPLICANTS

(f) An applicant for naturalization who moves from the district of the Service in the United States in which the application is pending may, at any time thereafter, request the Service to transfer the application to any district of the Service in the United States which may act on the application. The transfer shall not be made without the consent of the Attorney General. In the case of such a transfer, the proceedings on the application shall continue as though the application had originally been filed in the district of the Service to which the application is transferred.
Moving companies near me GJ.

USCIS has automated N-400 processing and when a change of address is received the jurisdictional transfer is a function built into the program. AFTER she is fingerprinted and IF you have a new address to submit, she can make the change online. She should get a follow-up letter a few days or a week. She should get confirmation, if not, call them and ask if it went through OK.

solved the problem?
 
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