Originally Posted by newacct

8 USC 1611(b)(3) seems to exempt the Medicare recipient from needing to be a qualified alien if they accrued enough credits to get Medicare Part A, or something like that:

Originally Posted by Britinsac

My wife and I lived in the U.S fifteen years and came back to UK in 2017 to look after parents with Alzheimers. We relinquished our green cards because we knew it might be for the long haul. Now we are waiting for approval of I-130 sponsorship by our daughter, the processing time is estimated to be 10.5 months which will give us a response date around mid February 2023. I know if we are approved we then have to file I-485 adjustment of status following that. I have read that this could take 8-14months to approve. Does this apply for I-130 sponsored too? Will we have a total wait of almost 2 years? I have read conflicting information online. The processing time for I-485 seem to apply to those applying for green card within the U.S. but do they also apply to those applying from outside the U.S? We are trying to estimate so many things, house sale, purchase, etc so it would be handy to have a clear estimate of the time it will take from I-130 approval. We also qualify for Social Security. I believe we will have to wait five years after returning before we can claim Medicare. We do have the ability to support ourselves with savings, pensions and social security. I sincerely appreciate any insight members can give.

Originally Posted by destone

Out of curiosity, why didn’t you apply for citizenship during your tenure in the US?

Originally Posted by S Folinsky

Actually, your circumstances are covered in the material you note.SanDiegogirl’s analysis strikes me as spot on. That said, beware that a U.S. clerk may make the very same mistaken reading that you did. It can be corrected, it’s just a PIA.

(I’m reminded of a lesson I received over 50 years back as a very young 1L in my class on Legal Research & Writing. An example was given of an attorney requesting a legal memorandum regarding a situation of a Cocker Spaniel biting a child. The law clerk comes back empty handed saying she could find no law. Attorney is amazed that there is no case law on dog bites. Law clerk replies that there are many published cases, but they involved setters, collies, retrievers, etc etc. But no cases regarding a Cocker Spaniel.)

Originally Posted by SanDiegogirl

Please let us know how you get on.....

Originally Posted by destone

Out of curiosity, why didn’t you apply for citizenship during your tenure in the US?

Originally Posted by Britinsac

We have just checked the status of the cases. My wife's case has an estimate of 2weeks for a decision - mine has a 3 months estimate, though they were filed together and linked. Is it possible to contact them and request a review of my case earlier when my wife' case is approved? Or is it generally the case that we will have to go ahead and do the consul processing and interview separately. Thank you for any advice.

Originally Posted by S Folinsky

I retired as State was transitioning over to the current system. So, I’m not really up on current procedures. I can say that under prior procedures separation of family cases would sometimes happen when it was not supposed to. There were channels open to attorneys to get the cases back on track as joined. Perhaps similar channels exist today.

Originally Posted by Britinsac

We have just checked the status of the cases. My wife's case has an estimate of 2weeks for a decision - mine has a 3 months estimate, though they were filed together and linked. Is it possible to contact them and request a review of my case earlier when my wife' case is approved? Or is it generally the case that we will have to go ahead and do the consul processing and interview separately. Thank you for any advice.

Originally Posted by tht

Can’t comment on family based, I did AOS based on employment… my employer had a lawyer working my case but they were not much help in getting updates, neither was infopass.

The other “channel” you can try if you have not retained a lawyer is to have your sponsor contact their local congress persons office.. they should have a web form and staff that deal with this. I never got an answer from my inquiry, but was approved shortly after submitting the request.

e.g.
https://www.gillibrand.senate.gov/he...orkers/request

Originally Posted by newacct

I-485 is the form for Adjustment of Status, which is the process of getting a green card from within the US. You are not in the US, and will not go through Adjustment of Status. Instead, you will go through Consular Processing to get an immigrant visa at a US consulate. This process does not involve an I-485. After the I-130 approval, your petition will go to the NVC and the consulate for processing. The total time from I-130 filing until you get the immigrant visa could take 1-2 years.

Originally Posted by Hallsy_

To add, not to be a negative nancy and your history in the US previous may exempt you from all/part of this, but the true backlog is with the NVC, not USCIS. It will take however long your processing center is publishing to get pre-approved by USCIS and then handed over to the NVC as you are applying outside of the country and for legal permanent residency again.

I am currently in the same boat, was approved out of USCIS Texas in 11 months (Feb '22) and my case has been with the NVC ever since. The only data you can use to review wait times at the NVC is the visa bulletin they release monthly though this data is often inaccurate and rarely changes. My immigration lawyers are predicting a further 5-7 years from today as someone who is being sponsored by a US citizen parent, and is unmarried but over 21.

Fingers crossed you are not looking at the same, frankly outrageous timelines.

Originally Posted by Hallsy_

The only data you can use to review wait times at the NVC is the visa bulletin they release monthly though this data is often inaccurate and rarely changes. My immigration lawyers are predicting a further 5-7 years from today as someone who is being sponsored by a US citizen parent, and is unmarried but over 21.