Patience required

Do you have conditional permanent residence? You will probably need some patience. If you married a U.S. citizen and obtained permanent residence less than two years after your marriage, then your permanent residence is conditional, which means that your first permanent residence card has a validity of two years. Three months before your card expires, you will need to submit a petition to remove the conditions of permanent residence.

Depending on your location, your petition will be processed by one of the four USCIS centers that handle them. The time it takes for each of the centers to process your application varies from 14.5 to 23 months. In some cases, the process can take up to 43 months. Yes, you read that right: in some circumstances, USCIS could take 3 years and 7 months to process the petition.

Normally, a few weeks after USCIS receives your petition, they will send you a receipt for the payment of fees in which they assign you a receipt number. The receipt will indicate that if you filed timely, you will have an 18-month extension to your permanent resident status.

Unfortunately, some applicants have had to wait weeks or months to receive that important notification in which USCIS grants them an extension of 18 months to their permanent resident status. We understand that this creates uncertainty, especially for those who need to travel abroad.

USCIS is constantly modernizing and automating processes. Every day, the agency processes thousands of requests, and with USCIS errors, applicants must prepare to wait a long time, usually at least 14 months, for the petition to be processed. If approved, you will have your second permanent residence card, now with a validity of 10 years.

For many people who file the petition to remove conditions, they become eligible to apply for U.S. citizenship while their petition to remove conditions is still pending. In fact, filing for naturalization can speed up your process. When the application for naturalization is made, there is an opportunity to provide more evidence that reinforces the request to remove the conditions. Part of the process in both includes an interview. USCIS often conducts both interviews on the same date.

Some advantages of naturalizing are that you will become a U.S. citizen, you will be able to vote, and you will obtain a United States passport. You also will never have to renew a permanent residence card again.

Posted in Adjustment of Status, Naturalization, Removing Conditions, U.S. Citizenship & Naturalization.