Rete

Huh?

I know what Matt's point was and that was not what I responding to.

You misunderstood which of Matt's questions I responded to ;-)

You only need a high school education to work for the USCIS. The role of adjudicator for cases such as asylum, residency, naturalization might require a liberal arts degree. The position in service centers where a worker goes over your I-129F petition most likely does not require a college degree. Those are the jobs that are most plentiful at the USCIS, not the position of adjudicators or managers or supervisors.

My point is that it is a stressful job. One that is repetition and abusive if you have to deal with the public. I equate it to being a city/county/state social worker: a thankless, stressful, dangerous means of employment for which one is vastly underpaid.

I once looked into working for the DOS and the jobs that are advertised I would be qualified for but the paid was approximately $20,000 less a year than what I was making at that time.

inquisitive40

Point taken
Patrick

Andrew DeFaria

Rete wrote:

    > Personally I take that as a poor analogy.

From the standpoint of pure customer service it suffices.

    > I have DSL and ours went out last week and the response I did get was
    > sorry for the problem but we are working on it. Don't know if it will
    > be fixed in an hour, this afternoon or tomorrow. Keep trying during
    > the day to see if it is up and running.

Yeah but you didn't get a "Check our web site to see if we are servicing
your number yet", coupled with "check back every few
days/weeks/months/years". And I'd also take it you would be exceeding
pissed if it were down for say even the amount of time a quick K1
approval of 3 months.

    > Have also had instances where in a heavy rain storm I would lose
    > telephone service but again they own the wires so I have to wait for
    > service.
    > I get the same from cablevision. When I need a repairman I have to
    > wait for an appointment which is never in the same week, let alone the
    > same day, that I want it.

If petitions took a day or a week then nobody would be complaining here.
But they are taking months and years. That's the point!

    > My alternative go to another means of access the internet or wait
    > until it is fixed or use a mobile phone and hope I am always in an
    > area with good reception.
    > You can't do that with the USCIS as they are the only ones capable of
    > granting the benefit you are seeking.

That's exactly the problem! It is a monopoly. You cannot go elsewhere.
Hence they have little incentive to perform better (haven't we learned
anything from the fall of communism?!?).

--
... File not found. Should I fake it? (Y/N)

scrubbedexpat099

Well you can go somewhere else, we decided for family reasons to move to the US, I do not know if this would have been the choice if we had known what we were letting ourself in for. Difficult to believe now how nieve we were.

Nobody I have spoken to in the real world, US or elsewhere, took me seriously when I have explained the issues you have to deal with. I knew how long it took roughly to go the other way and stupidly assumed it would be similar to come to US. Is there any other country with the delays?

When it all comes down to it, the timelines they gave you were false and looking at what they are processing now will be false for your case, which of course is the only one you are interested in, but better than nothing I suppose.

I assume that most people processing applications do not use Boards such as these and are reliant on what their Lawyers tell them or looking on the USCIS site if the are computer literate.

Perhaps they should put Health warnings on the forms, the Ciggie manufacturers have to.

"USCIS can be seriously dangerous to your nerves"

and having had the processing explained I still do not understand the disparances in time lines.

J Moreno

In article <[email protected]> ,
Matthew Udall <member3997@british_expats.com> wrote:

    > Patrick, have you ever toured the service centers? They are very well
    > organized and efficient. They have been using computers long before
    > 9/11, and when you talk to someone at a service center (or I assume
    > the NC- SC line), they can tell you the same things that appears on
    > the screen you can get when punching in your case number (with a
    > couple of additio- nal things such as, when the case has been shipped
    > off, where it went and when it was sent).
    >
    > The files actually are put on a shelf in the order they arrive, and
    > as an officer finishes up the cases he or she might have, they call
    > up a contract worker who goes to the shelf in the file room and fills
    > up a bin or two (or more) and beings them back to the officer. Each
    > bin usually holds around 25 case files.

If they *really* computerized, there wouldn't be any bins to get, all
of the information would be on the computer and it'd be possible to say
exactly where a particular case was in the queue.

And really, *that's* the information that people want -- how many
people are ahead of them. The way it's done at the moment, that
information doesn't exist, but really it's what people want.

You say they want to be able to cut in line, and while I'm sure that is
something that most of them wouldn't mind, I don't think it's what they
really want.

Personally, if I could have checked online somewhere and been told
(accurately) that "there are X cases ahead of you as of now" and came
back 8 hours later and been told "there are X-1 cases ahead of you as
of now", I would have been way less stressed. I might have been less
than thrilled about it not going down by more than one, but at least
I'd have known where I stood.

Totally computerizing it would also have some other benefits -- namely
that you don't have to file redundant forms (4 copies of the
G-325a?!!?), or even fill in unnecessary fields (get rid of the "none"
and "n/a" debate for those fields that aren't necessary, currently
filling out an I-134, and according to the advice here, I should fill
in questions 1a-1d with "N/A" as I'm a native born USC). Not to
mention -- instantly available at the local Embassy, no sending it via
courier pouch or wiring it.

--
J. Moreno

inquisitive40

How could you possibly conceive a paperless filing? With that system it would be much MORE likely to screw up (a simple mis-typed name by the applicant would cause the system to lose a file and maybe even automatically reject an applicant). I think it really still needs hard copies of the forms and that all that it needs from there would be the processing officer to enter in a comment (maybe a status code) when a certain part of his processing is done (probably something like this already happens but not as in depth as it might be). Then applicants would have "some idea" of where they are BUT as was said already every application is different, anything from a simple spelling mistake straight through to a loss of a filed document can cause delays and this is the sort of thing that happens both in private and government sectors.

I think they are headed in the right direction at present (won't affect current filiers a lot I would think though) and in the future things hopefully will get faster.

All the blame really does not lie with the USCIS, remember they are still trying to catch and prevent the very prevelent fraud by people coming from less wealthy nations and playing US citizens for fools to get green cards. Now if that fraud did not exist immigration here would be SO much easier.

Patrick

scrubbedexpat099

I doubt very much if this is their brief, official or otherwise. Or the reality of the majority of applications. There are obviously some perceived hot spots who do go through a few extra hoops.

If the waiting related to something that was happening, then so be it.

Our first 7 months was just waiting for it to get to the top of the pile. It then did move, with a few fits and starts, without the 7 months it would not have been so bad.

And then why make an issue of AP's and EAD's, if they got rid of the crap then they could probably provide a timely service.

The forms look they were designed in the era of manual typewriters, no harm in bringing them up to date, make life easier for everybody.

J Moreno

In article <[email protected]> ,
inquisitive40 <[email protected]> wrote:

-snip system should be totally computerized-

    > How could you possibly conceive a paperless filing? With that system it
    > would be much MORE likely to screw up (a simple mis-typed name by the
    > applicant would cause the system to lose a file and maybe even automati-
    > cally reject an applicant).

First of all, how is that different from how it is now, and secondly,
no it wouldn't because things wouldn't key primarily off of names, but
off of a number -- either a number that UCSIS/DHLS/STATE supplied or
SSN/passport number.

    > I think it really still needs hard copies of the forms and that all
    > that it needs from there would be the processing officer to enter in
    > a comment (maybe a status code) when a certain part of his processing
    > is done (probably something like this already happens but not as in
    > depth as it might be). Then applicants would have "some idea" of
    > where they are BUT as was said already every application is di-
    > fferent, anything from a simple spelling mistake straight through to
    > a loss of a filed document can cause delays and this is the sort of
    > thing that happens both in private and government sectors.

If everything was computerized, then loss of a filed document would
have exactly one place to happen -- when it was being entered into the
system by a USCIS employee (for those documents not filed online).

As for delays -- both returned/delayed and expedited case processing
can be accounted for (most simply by providing two numbers, "initial"
and "pending" where initial is your place in the queue and "pending"
are those that may "cut" in front of you and be handled be handled
without a new wait).

But really, unless they are a significant fraction of the case, you
don't need to do that -- they'll get lost in the noise of it taking a
different amount of time to handle each individual case, so just report
the "untouched" cases that are ahead of my untouched case, and that'll
be good enough.

    > I think they are headed in the right direction at present (won't
    > affect current filiers a lot I would think though) and in the future
    > things ho- pefully will get faster.
    >
    > All the blame really does not lie with the USCIS, remember they are st-
    > ill trying to catch and prevent the very prevelent fraud by people com-
    > ing from less wealthy nations and playing US citizens for fools to get
    > green cards. Now if that fraud did not exist immigration here would be
    > SO much easier.

None of the information submitted for a K1 visa to the service center
is particularly well suited to achieving that goal, so I rather doubt
if that is the goal.

And that's not really an achievable goal in any case -- previous
criminal history might help, but absent that, there's really no way to
tell the difference (particularly at two steps removed) to tell
"committed to a relationship" from "intends to stick around long enough
to get a GC, then leave" (or for that matter to tell "USC intends to
take advantage of naive non-USC" from "USC is committed to
relationship").

And they don't ask for (at least at this stage) the one piece of
information that would help identify at least some types of alien fraud
-- their passport number.

--
J. Moreno

Andrew DeFaria

Boiler wrote:

    > Well you can go somewhere else,

Being the USC, born in New Jersey, and with a daughter from my first
marraige here in California, sorry but no - I ain't leaving!

--
Do witches run spell checkers?

Andrew DeFaria

inquisitive40 wrote:

    >> In article <[email protected]> ,
    >> Matthew Udall <member3997@british_expats.com> wrote:
    >>> Patrick, have you ever toured the service centers? They are very
    >>> well organized and efficient. They have been using computers long
    >>> before 9/11, and when you talk to someone at a service center (or I
    >>> assume the NC- SC line), they can tell you the same things that
    >>> appears on the screen you can get when punching in your case number
    >>> (with a couple of additio- nal things such as, when the case has
    >>> been shipped off, where it went and when it was sent).
    >>> The files actually are put on a shelf in the order they arrive, and
    >>> as an officer finishes up the cases he or she might have, they call
    >>> up a contract worker who goes to the shelf in the file room and
    >>> fillls up a bin or two (or more) and beings them back to the
    >>> officer. Each bin usually holds around 25 case files.
    >> If they *really* computerized, there wouldn't be any bins to get, all
    >> of the information would be on the computer and it'd be possible to
    >> say exactly where a particular case was in the queue.
    >> And really, *that's* the information that people want -- how many
    >> people are ahead of them. The way it's done at the moment, that
    >> information doesn't exist, but really it's what people want.
    >> You say they want to be able to cut in line, and while I'm sure that
    >> is something that most of them wouldn't mind, I don't think it's what
    >> they really want.
    >> Personally, if I could have checked online somewhere and been told
    >> (accurately) that "there are X cases ahead of you as of now" and came
    >> back 8 hours later and been told "there are X-1 cases ahead of you as
    >> of now", I would have been way less stressed. I might have been less
    >> than thrilled about it not going down by more than one, but at least
    >> I'd have known where I stood.
    >> Totally computerizing it would also have some other benefits --
    >> namely that you don't have to file redundant forms (4 copies of the
    >> G-325a?!!?), or even fill in unnecessary fields (get rid of the "none"
    >> and "n/a" debate for those fields that aren't necessary, currently
    >> filling out an I-134, and according to the advice here, I should fill
    >> in questions 1a-1d with "N/A" as I'm a native born USC). Not to
    >> mention -- instantly available at the local Embassy, no sending it
    >> via courier pouch or wiring it.
    >> --
    >> J. Moreno
    > How could you possibly conceive a paperless filing?

Oh horrors! :-(

    > With that system it would be much MORE likely to screw up (a simple
    > mis-typed name by the applicant would cause the system to lose a file
    > and maybe even automatically reject an applicant).

How do you figure?!? Most likely all those forms would end up being PDF
files (knowing the gov) and thus there would be no "keying" on textual
fields as name...

    > I think it really still needs hard copies of the forms

This is exactly the sort of thinking that keeps them in the "dark ages".

    > and that all that it needs from there would be the processing officer
    > to enter in a comment (maybe a status code) when a certain part of his
    > processing is done (probably something like this already happens but
    > not as in depth as it might be).

Old mainframe "batch" file thinking...

    > Then applicants would have "some idea" of where they are BUT as was
    > said already every application is different,

Every mortgage loan application is different. They seem to manage better
than the USCIS (though not by much).

    > anything from a simple spelling mistake straight through to a loss of
    > a filed document can cause delays and this is the sort of thing that
    > happens both in private and government sectors.

Simple miskeying the proper "code" would be as bad by your design.
People remember and handle names better than codes where the meaning of
such a "code" obscures the semantics of what the code means.

    > I think they are headed in the right direction at present (won't
    > affect current filiers a lot I would think though) and in the future
    > things hopefully will get faster.
    > All the blame really does not lie with the USCIS, remember they are
    > still trying to catch and prevent the very prevelent fraud by people
    > coming from less wealthy nations and playing US citizens for fools to
    > get green cards. Now if that fraud did not exist immigration here
    > would be SO much easier.

It's been documented already, at least with immigration marriage-fraud,
that fraud is a tiny part of the problem (from memory, like 5% of the
marriages are suspected of fraud and like 1% is actually proven
fraudulent). The USCIS spend much more of it's time and resources trying
to stop illegals from coming across the border than chasing down the
some 7 millions or so illegal immigrants be they here on a simple
overstay, a criminal conviction or sneaking across the border.

--
I said "NO" to drugs, but they didn't listen.

trasmus

Apparently, you have never been to Texas. It so happens that we are very friendly to "foreigners". Come on down and visit us for a few days and find out.

Michelle

cindyabs

In spite of my unhappiness right now with Missouri and the EAD situation, they were faster than a speeding bullet last year. It seems that they all take turns being the tortoise rather than the hare.

Folinskyinla

Hi:

While cooling my heels at OAK yesterday, I took the opportunity to chat with an old high school friend who just lost his father. He has both a law degree and a masters in computer science from top schools. In the Jewish custom of letting the mourner set the tone of the conversation, we started discussing electronic balloting.

We had discussed the 2001 MIT/CalTech report on voting issued aftter the 2000 fiasco -- and it turns out the most reliable and secure method of voting is -- paper ballots. However, slower to count. My friend believes that the problem with electronic voting is that electronic methods have the potential to be tampered with or just screw up without detection. I asked about the old mechanical voting machines which used to be used in New York and San Francisco. My friend was of the opinion that mechanical devices are much more open to inspection.

My friends solution was to separate the voting and the counting functions. Most of the concern about "paper trail" is for auditing and backup. My friend would have electronic voting machines which would generate a printed card which would be in a font which would be both eye and machine readable. And this would be the OFFICIAL ballot. Any tabulations generated by the vote taking system would be unofficial and advisory only.

An interesting conversation.

Andrew DeFaria

Folinskyinla wrote:

    > Hi:
    > While cooling my heels at OAK yesterday, I took the opportunity to
    > chat with an old high school friend who just lost his father. He has
    > both a law degree and a masters in computer science from top schools.
    > In the Jewish custom of letting the mourner set the tone of the
    > conversation, we started discussing electronic balloting.
    > We had discussed the 2001 MIT/CalTech report on voting issued aftter
    > the 2000 fiasco -- and it turns out the most reliable and secure
    > method of voting is -- paper ballots.

Electronic voting can be as secure as paper ballots if not more. Using
electronic voting does not preclude generating a paper ballot for those
who just gotta have paper in their hands nor does it preclude an audit
trail - indeed a more sophisticated and easier to track audit trail.
It's not like paper ballots cannot be compromised anyway.

    > However, slower to count. My friend believes that the problem with
    > electronic voting is that electronic methods have the potential to be
    > tampered with or just screw up without detection.

While your friend may believe it, does he know it for sure? Paper
ballots also have a potential to be tampered with or just screwed up
without detection too. Who knows how many hanging chads there are out
there that nobody complained about in the past?

    > I asked about the old mechanical voting machines which used to be used
    > in New York and San Francisco. My friend was of the opinion that
    > mechanical devices are much more open to inspection.

Really? How so? How is electronic means of voting more closed to inspection?

    > My friends solution was to separate the voting and the counting
    > functions. Most of the concern about "paper trail" is for auditing and
    > backup. My friend would have electronic voting machines which would
    > generate a printed card which would be in a font which would be both
    > eye and machine readable.

It's not the font that is machine readable - it's the ink! (though there
are purely optical ways of scanning they are less reliable. Checks, for
example, use magnetic ink)

    > And this would be the OFFICIAL ballot. Any tabulations generated by
    > the vote taking system would be unofficial and advisory only.

Never understood why when I go into vote and leave I am given a silly
sticker that says "I voted" but I am not given a summary card of who and
what I voted for. As you know in California there are often many
propositions on the ballot and it's hard to keep track of it all when
you watch the results. I'm often wondering "Now for Prop 123 did I vote
yeah or nay?". Sure I could meticulously mark my sample ballot but
that's bulky and I tend to get rid of it after voting. Seems to me a
simple card with your recorded votes would be the thing to hand the
voter - not a sticker!
--
Hang up and drive.

Rete

That is an assumption as well. I can point you to two members of this newsgroup over the last 6 1/2 years who used US Citizens for entrance into the US and residency only to walk out of the marriage with them telling their spouses exactly when they married them in the first place and it wasn't for love. One was from the UK. So it is not just citizens of improvished third world nations that use any means available to gain a green card.

Rete