khi_boy interview experience
Story - I485 interview at San Jose office
Yesterday I had my I485 interview at INS San Jose local office.
Interview was scheduled at 12:30 but I reached an hour early with my wife and son. My Attorney reached in time. I dropped my letter in the box at room 200 and waited for the call. A young officer showed up, and my attorney didn't seem to be too happy seeing him.
Background:
I485 WAC 02-057-xxx , ND: Dec 05/2000
Case transfered to San Jose local office from Laguna Nigel in Nov 2003 for interview. Reason of interview = UNKNOWN. I didn't change job during the whole greencard period and my wages met prevailing wages in Labour cert. Same title
My sponsoring company was acquired by one of giant bluechip telecom company. It was an acquisition but they retained my original company EIN# and TAXID as is. So i was still getting all paychecks and W2 with original company name during all this time. So I was techincally working for still same company and my paystubs , W2 and income tax forms reflected that clearly.
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Officer called me to go inside with him in his room. We sat
in front of the officer and my attorney sat at the chair back
to me. Officer asked me and my wife to stand up , raise our right
hand and take oath that whatever we say will be truth.
He showed up a form and took our fingerprints. Then he pulled our 485 application and started verifying the contents / names etc. He asked the general questionarie, Was I convicted? did I ever do this , did I ever do that etc.
After finishing general questionaire. My attorney spoke, this is
straight forward case and he is still working for sponsoring employer. She is not sure why case is transferred to local office for in person interview. Officer opened the file and started looking here and there within bunch of papers and said he cannot see any notation on my file about why is this case transffered. ( I believe its actually due to my country of birth).
Officer then asked for my W2s, paystubs and income tax forms and started to panic that its an acquisition and sponsoring company is diluted.
My Attorney told him that its just change of ownership not a regular merger. I work for company X . Before Joe used to own company X and now Simon owns same company X . It shouldn't impact me as I am still working for same company, same wages and same title. Officer kept reviewing the docs once more , then he asked company financial report and how many people work in company. I gave him my parent company's 200 pages last quarterly report and SEC filings which clearly shows multi
billion dollars revenue. He was again not happy and said this the
parent companies financial report , he wants to see the financial
report under my company's name. Attorney explained to him that
my original companies common stocks are converted to parent company's stock and no more traded so this is the report. Officer asked me don't you have that fancy colered financial report??? I was clueless (which colored report he is asking)???? Infact , in interview appointment letter officer never asked for any financial report. I just took that the report proactively from my company's website. My attorney raised his tone to officer and said, see he is still working for sponsoring company , he has his last 4 yrs returns under same name, he was his paystubs and
employment letter clearly indicating that. He has his 1040 income tax forms for last 3 yrs. Its a straightforward case, officer became silent for sometime.
Then officer asked for my birth certificates. Officer very
throughly checked birth record photocopies with originals , item
by item and tick-marked with pen. He checked a few more
docs.
Now the very interesting part begins......Officer asked for all of my
EADs and he striped out I94s from mine and my wife from Passport. He said , I cannot take the decision now!!!. I'll mail you the decision by mail shortly. I got upset. I asked him politely if you are not approving my case now then why are you taking my I94s??? If tommorow , someone comes and ask me what my status is what I am supposed to reply??? (I read a story on immigration portal where a guy was crying because
officer took her wife's I94 and didn't send him any approval).
Officer said, he is not going to approve case on spot.
He told my attorney this gentleman doesn't want to give his I94? explain to him . ( Explain to me what??? ) . Attorney told me , khi_boy give him what he is asking. So officer took my EADs and I94s out of passpot and I came out of the office bare handed. I spoke with my attorney , she said if he doesn't take decision my next week, she will start bugging him or go to his supervisor.
Story ended at this point. I am keeping my fingers crossed and
watching out whats next.
I hope officer really meant "shortly"
I am very uncomfortable by the act of taking all my EADs and I94s
without approval. Did any had similar experience?
thx
Khi_boy
