Congratulations! Were either of those field offices local to you?

@G G Thanks a lot! Albuquerque was my nearest FO. USCIS did not disclose why they did the transfer to Providence.

Congrats! how long did it take to approve after transfer?

@yes greened Thank you! Around a month I believe. But USCIS never gave me the exact date of transfer. I was just chatting periodocally with agent through Emma to get any updates.

congratulations

congratulations! I just saw status update on my EB1A i140 case as Rfe. how long does it take to receive what rfe are they asking for? will they send it to my attorney?

@Kr rk Thanks! RFE took around 2 weeks to arrive, they sent a copy to my lawyer as well. Unfortunately, there is no way to check it online, so just be patient. Good luck!

@f ns thanks for the support! wondering how was your rfe? did they accept any criteria or they rejected everything? from the online search I see that some officers can be brutal and reject for every criteria and sometimes it may be better to withdraw the case and reapply. quite confused now 😔

@Kr rk They challenged 2 out of 3 criteria. First, significance in the field saying that citations are not indicative enough. So with the help of my lawyer I gathered a few more letters and statistics about my field to prove significance of contributions. Second, they challenged judging work of others which was absolutely ridiculous since I literally attached proof of 20+ original peer-reviewes. So, we also gathered a few letters from journal editors and basically reply that I definetely qualify. After receiving RFE they apparently approved the case within minutes. I remember seeing status updates like "RFE response received" and "case approved" less than 10 minutes apart. This actually brings me to the next point confirmed by my lawyers - premium processing increases RFE chances by a factor of 3. Obviously, in some cases they just don't have time to evaluate your case and send RFE request to take an action within 15 days. I guess, all RFEs are different, some are brutal, some are just for time-extension, some are more or less reasonable. Hopefully, they will accept your response and approve the case!

@Kr rk If you are filing with the lawyers, they probably have statistics per offices and can advise you whether response is worth the time. They successfully replied to the officer who issued me an RFE, and they felt confident we can get approval.

@f ns thank you so much! I really appreciate. I m still waiting for the RFE document. hopefully will get it soon. can you please share your lawyer details? looks like they are quite experienced and can handle rfe effectively. thank you

https://www.wegreened.com/ They successfully helped me with NIW case as well. They specialize in science-related petitions mostly. You cannot usually choose a specific lawyer though. They assign someone to work on your case but it seems that their approach is standardized in a good sense. Hopefuelly, they would be able to help you as well!

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