joeyb

Our priority date on our F4 visa application will be reached next year. Can someone tell me, in basic terms, what happens when it is reached?
We have heard that it can take some time to process after that.

Thanks
Jo

Ray

Are you talking F-4 USA or Ausralia ...

meauxna

It will? How do you know?

About one year before the Dept of State thinks that your number will come current, they will contact you to get the intial steps of the Immigrant Visa application going.
The first thing is a Choice of Agent, followed by a bill, DS-230, another bill, I-864 and then the civil document collection.
The idea is that your application is ready for interview as soon as your PD is current.

joeyb

Hi Ray

I am talking F4 USA.
We have had our application in for about 10 years now.

Folinskyinla

Hi:

BTW, the convention for family based immigrant side of the visa shop is "FB-4".

I want to warn against a common but fallacious belief -- if the current priority date is within a year of your priority date, then you are about a year away. The fallacy arises in that the system give a set number of visas per fiscal year -- and if there are more applicants than slots, the numbers will move slowly, and sometimes even backwards.

Take a look at the history of the FB-4 allocations, they do not move in a linear fashion. Sometimes they may jump a lot, but usually not.

As mentioned elsewhere, the National Visa Center should contact you and/or the petitioner when the Department of State thinks you are about a year away. It is a good idea to advise NVC of the current addresses of you and your US sibling.