Okay she gave me ALL of my originals....oh look even my Prima Facie came in the mail. She never gives me the envelopes that these documents came in as I'll be able to see the date when uscis sent my stuff out. Look! I'm just glad that I have my documents in my possession & I'm nearing the finishing line. 🙏

find another attorney

sorry to hear that. You should find another attorney. Sometimes they forget that they work for US, their client! We're not begging them to do anything for free, we pay alot of money for their services!

go to her office ,let her know you gonna call the police and make a report with them and in the attorney committee

ec ~ thanks, but it's easier said than done. That was my intention prior, just didn't know it would take 2yrs to get the EAD.

The next step is the GC. I mailed the AR11 form off last week. Rennay V as you stated, some attys forget who works for who. $8k is a lot of money to hand over to someone who disappears on you & ignores all forms of communication from their client. Nina MR, I've contacted the Fla Bar 3 times already on her for not handing over docs in a timely manner & for non response. They're no help whatsoever.

REVIEWS ~ T N 8 reviews·2 photos a year ago Critical: Professionalism, Quality, Responsiveness I did not have a positive experience. Nicole Avila was highly referred to me by a friend of a friend who are both attorneys. My husband & I had very high hopes. Our expectations were not met. We scheduled an initial consult through the website which gave us the option to schedule an in-person or virtual consult given COVID. We selected the in person option & our appointment was confirmed. We drove half an hour to the office, the doors were locked. When we called, we learned that the office is not doing any in-person visits & that it was supposed to be a virtual zoom consult, due to error from their website. We gave the benefit of the doubt. When we contacted Nicole to let her know that we wanted to retain her, she advised that she would send us a contract. A few days went by, we did not receive anything. I called again a week later & she apologized & said that she would send the contract by day end. We never received that email. I am a medical professional & this was by far one of the most unprofessional experiences. My husband & I ended up finding a different attorney for less than 1/4th the fees quoted to us by Avila Law. I can't imagine what a nightmare our immigration process would have been had we retained Avila Law. 1

Photo of Diana Gutierrez Diana Gutierrez 7 months ago Please do not make the mistake of hiring her. I am very aware of the adverse professional and personal implications of a bad review. That is why I was hesitant to do it, but I feel the need, if not the right, to complain after the lack of professionalism of this lawyer. Nicole was referred to us by some friends, and since she had good reviews, we felt confident and hired her. We thought her fees were high, but we decided to trust her, so we paid her $4650, which she requested to be paid upfront. We hired her in January 2019, then, around February, the Covid-19 pandemic started, and with it, our problems with Nicole. Around March, we received a letter from the UCIS requesting a new form, worried about this, we sent her several emails, called, left many messages with her assistant for more than a month. Oh, by the way, she never gave us her phone, it was the one from her office, a co-working space. She finally answered back, and we submitted the documents. We thought, it was just an isolated incident. After this, she completely disappeared from June to November. She did not answer our emails, calls, nothing. We were worried because the UCIS sent us a letter saying that we did not attach the medical examination, so we wanted her to tell us what happened because we sent her this document. Finally, on November 4th, she answered our emails, saying she was sorry and swamped. I mean, Covid has been hard for all of us, but writing a short email only takes 5 minutes; it does not justify ignoring us for almost five months. She forgot to attach our medical examination to the package sent to the UCIS; she said that we should do it again and that she would refund us the money ASAP; well, the ASAP was more than a month of her being unresponsive. In March 2021, we tried to contact her again. Tired of this situation, we looked for her on the internet, and we realized that she was working somewhere else, so we sent an email to her work email, she rushed to answer this one, unlike the one she gave to us. We received the citation for the interview during this same month, and I wanted to have everything ready way before this day... Again, she disappeared until the day before the interview, and we needed several documents from her to take with us. The day before the interview, we had to go to her office to pick all these documents up. We had to ask for the day off to go, and while there, she just sent an email saying that her printer was not working! She said she would have the documents delivered to us at the UCIS office before the interview, but knowing her now, we did not want to take that risk, so we decided to print them ourselves. After the email, she popped out of her office and briefly explained want to expect about the interview; she said that she would not attend the interview with us in person but that she would be on the phone with the UCIS agent. At the beginning of the interview, the UCIS agent asked us if we had a lawyer with us. He looked at his records and said, well, she did not send the email with the required information for us to be able to contact her during your interview. This situation was the cherry on top of the cake! We decided to move forward without her; even the UCIS agent was amazed about her lack of professionalism. After the interview, I sent her an email asking her if she indeed sent the required information to the UCIS. I wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt, she NEVER answered back. I looked at the contract again, and she was brilliant in not saying that she would go with us to the interview. The only thing she commits to doing is filling out the paperwork. We trusted her, and we made the big mistake (yes, we were naive and stupid) of not reading every detail of the contract. We wanted to submit a complaint to the Florida BAR, but we honestly want to leave this in the past and move forward with our lives. Our experience with her was disappointing, humiliating, and infuriating.

@k p sorry about your ordeal. Were you scheduled for an interview for i485

S P ~ Thanks. No I’m not

@ k p that’s good. So your interview was waived?

S P I just got the EAD, I haven’t gotten any notifications about my interview. That’s the last step, I’m not there yet.

Go to BBB and report her office. She will respond quickly. Shame of Nicole, hope she didn't find any clients anymore. Good luck

so it is approved yay 😁 good m girl send a letter to Vermont before they start your i485 process

Josh bigosh ~ On Google it states her firm is permanently closed. I was shocked. More reason to get my documents from her even quicker. 😳 liza liza ~ Which letter should I send? You mean regarding the change of address so all mail can come directly to me?

yes KP and you have to make sure to sign. cause I’ve heard the AR-11 isn’t enough

Okay, we’ll I did draft a letter stating who I was. I included the AR11 form along w/the email confirmation from USCIS that they received my change of address notice. I sent it off certified mail on Friday.

Ohok good well keep me posted on what they reply

liza liza ~ Will do.

@kp she probably had other issue with clients. Unfortunately, she did not know how to make money being an attorney.

Josh bigosh ~ She always had something going on. The first time in 2020 when she made the appt for me to come to the office to sign the EAD application, she didn’t answer ANY of my correspondence. I called, text, left vm asking where she was, I was waiting in the lobby for her. She never responded until a month later & she FedEx the application to my house!

Well, let's pray for her. We never know what's she is going through.

@Krish90 krish @ ~ sorry for the late response. Learning new job, getting used to working in an office again after being out of the work scene since 2002. Keep the faith. I follow your stories on this app & I can sympathize w/your frustration. I’m confident you’ll hear something this year. I’m looking at Vawa applicants who now have their GC’s & the pattern, imo, looks like the GC’s are approved around the yr mark of the Vawa approval. Let me know if you agree/disagree. I filed my i485 (Jan 2018) after I was married. I’m not seeing that many ppl in my situation who filed ALL their documents (ie i485…765…i130) then yrs later filed for Vawa. I KNOW that USCIS has the i485, as they stat s they will contact me when they make a decision on it. Let me ask you, have you heard that the i485 priority date is actually the date of the Vawa approval? I always thought it was the date that USCIS received the i485. idk, it’s all so confusing & it doesn’t help that we can’t get info from anyone at USCIS about the Vawa cases.

Thanks dear. I’m going to see if I hear anything regarding my i485 by May (6 months since Vawa approval). if not, I’m going to submit a request to find out what’s going on. Like I said, I know they have the i485, as it’s stated in this Vawa approval that they’ll make a decision on it. It’s just such a long wait. I heard that they (USCIS) had hired ppl to work Vawa cases to get them moving along.

This is wild @Krish90 Did you check to make sure that USCIS has your current address & information? This seems a bit too extreme now. Enough is enough!

@Krish90 ~ I filed for Vawa in 2019. My husband filed my papers (360, i765 & i485) in 2018, a few months after we got married. It took 24 months for my Vawa to be approved.

@Krish90, I seriously hope that won’t be the case for you. 🙏🏾

Wait a minute.......I heard that they had HIRED ppl to specifically work on VAWA cases? Which is it? Enough w/the excuses, we need results & cases approved. This is disgusting the way ppl are having to wait. This is ppl's livelihood they're messing with.

They have to come up w/another reason other than this. If you’re under staffed, why not hire more bodies? They charge enough for filing fees, so it’s not like they don’t have the funds to pay workers