I-130 Petition (English version)

IMPORTANT: This is what I sent in my file, it does not mean that EVERYBODY has to do it the same way, cases vary widely.

I-130 content

1) Cover Letter signed and dated;

2) Form G-1145, E-Notification of Application/Petition Acceptance;

3) Form I-130, signed just part E of the page #2 by the petitioner, don’t sign part F if you prepared the I-130 by yourself;

4) Form G-325A for the petitioner, signed by him;

5) 2 passport style pictures of the petitioner; write the petitioner’s full name in the back of the photos and put them in a ziplock bag, write the petitioner’s full name on the ziplock bag as well;

6) Form G-325A for the beneficiary, signed by the spouse;

7) 2 passport style pictures of the beneficiary; write the beneficiary’s full name in the back of the photos and put them in a ziplock bag, write the beneficiary’s full name on the ziplock bag as well;

8) Sponsor’s proof of American citizenship; it can be either a copy of the birth certificate or a copy of all passport pages (the passport is the best option); colored copies are better too. We used his passport.

9) Evidence of a bonafide marriage to support your petition;

a - Wedding certificate (certified copy provided by the courthouse)

b - Documentation showing joint ownership of property;

c - A lease showing joint tenancy of a common residence.

d - Documentation showing co-mingling of financial resources such as a joint bank account & joint tax filings.

e - Birth certificates of children born to you and your spouse together.

f - Affidavits sworn to or affirmed by third parties having personal knowledge of the bona fides of the marital relationship. Each affidavit must contain the full name and address, date and place of birth of the person making the affidavit, his or her relationship to the petitioner or beneficiary, if any, and complete information and details explaining how the person acquired his or her knowledge of your marriage.

g - Any other relevant documentation to establish that there is an ongoing marital union. While a minimum of one of the documents listed in items above may be sufficient, you are strongly encouraged to include as many pieces of documentation as you can obtain. Simply sending receipts showing that you have wired money to your spouse may not be sufficient to establish a bona fide marriage.

Note: Send only photocopies. The USCIS will request original copies if necessary (unlikely).

IMPORTANT

If any of these documents are not in English, you will need to include a translation. Anybody can do the translation.

The person doing the translation must sign their name at the bottom of the translation and state the following:

"I certify that I am competent to translate (put foreign language name here) to English, and that this is a complete and correct translation".

Beware of anyone trying to sell you "official" or "certified" translations. There is no official certification process for translations that is recognized by the USCIS. In our cases, when we had to translate documents, I did it by myself (beneficiary) and I attached the translation right after the document translated.

Now with your file full of documents and ready to go, you can send it to the USCIS. NOA1 (notice of action 1) should be received in 20 days but generally it arrives before. It means they have checked your process and at first sight, it seems everything is in order. After that you have the hardest part of the process to come, the long waiting...NOA2 can take up to 8 months to be received, but it generally comes a little bit before you can reach the 6 months mark, mine took 179 days to come (5 months and 27 days). Receiving NOA2 means you have been approved and all the documents you have sent were accepted. Your file now will be forwarded to the NVC (National Visa Center) for futher processing. I will give details on NVC progress here in another topic. These informations were related to the years of 2011-2012 (I received NOA1 on september 1 of 2011 and NOA2 on february 27 of 2012), before you get started, check on the waiting times and the right place you need to mail your petition, the right USCIS Office for you will vary according to your address in the US. My petiton was forwarded to the CSC (California Service Center), but honestly I think that during the time I was under processing, Vermont Service Center was faster. Good luck!