Ineptitude at it's finest
I am so frustrated, I almost don't know where to begin. My wife and I are waiting for her permanent residency status to come through. We applied for it in early December 2003, and the Citizenship and Immigration Services sent us a receipt telling us they "officially" received the application on 11 December 2003. According to their website, they are currently processing applications for our district that were received in March 2004. So, since ours was received about 3 months before this, we've been trying to find out what the status of our case is.
We called the National Service Hotline in mid February 2005, and we were told that they would submit an inquiry, and we should hear something in 30-90 days. Now, I'm confused as to why we should have to wait 30-90 days when they are already overdue, but we'll play along here.
So we wait 30 days, and we hear nothing, so we call back to see what is going on, and they tell us that they have no record of an inquiry going in. So, I guess if you are a government agency, you don't have to actually DO what you say you are going to do. Okay, so we put in another inquiry, and are told to wait another 30 days.
This is getting old, so my wife calls our Senator's office to put in an inquiry via the Senator's office. We're hoping that the agency might actually respond to a Senator. About a week later, she called again, and was told that it would take about 10 business days to get a response from the agency, so they would get back to us.
About 30 days had passed after our last call to the agency hotline, and still nothing. So, we call again on April 18. This time, we are told that this will be the third inquiry, and if we still don't hear anything after 30 more days, we can call back again, at which point they will give us further instructions. So, essentially, we're getting the brush off every time we call.
During this time, my wife has spent about 4 weeks trying to get an appointment at the local service center to talk to somebody in person. We finally got an appointment in late April, so we go in to the local service center, and we are told that our file is actually not even here at the local district office. It's apparently still at the National Benefits Service Center in Missouri, and we have to wait for it to come to the local district before it can be processed. I'm amazed that the local office is working on files received 3 months after ours, yet our file isn't even here. How did all of these other files get here? I'm really getting irritated with this agency at this point. What does the guy at the office recommend? Take a guess. Yup...WAIT 30 MORE DAYS!! Imagine that.
Now, this is really getting to be a major issue, because my wife and I are planning on going to Korea for our second anniversary, in order to have the traditional Korean wedding ceremony that is overdue. But, my wife can't travel freely without having permanent resident status. She has to get special permission to travel outside of the country. That means we have to apply for these papers (of course that means we have to pay another $165 too), wait the 4-5 months for those papers to process, and hope that they are done in time for our trip.
So essentially, since this agency has failed to complete it's obligations in the time that they themselves have set, I am now stuck with an additional financial burden, and may have to cancel my wedding, and all the guests coming from the U.S. (5 people) will essentially have wasted the money for an international flight. Nice.
So, we called the agency again today to find out what the F&*K is going on. They tell us that they don't know exactly where the file is (of course they don't...why would the NATIONAL SERVICE CENTER HAVE ANY IDEA OF WHAT IS GOING ON?). They (actually, Vicky, the "lady" who answered my call) went on to tell me that since we last called on 18 April, she can't do anything until 30 days have passed. In her words, I have to give the agency 30 days to respond to the inquiry. Of course, she didn't answer me when I asked why they didn't answer for the first 82 days that I've been waiting. I just have to wait 8 more days before I can call again and have them give me more information (which I am pretty sure will comprise of them telling me to wait for 30 days). I just can't believe this crap.
I feel like I'm in the Army again, and going to Sick Call.
Complaint: "I have leg pains", Answer: "Take Motrin"
Complaint: "I have a fever", Answer: "Take Motrin"
Complaint: "My foot fell off", Answer: "Take Motrin"
Complaint: "My file is overdue", Answer: "Wait 30 days"
Complaint: "My file is STILL overdue", Answer, "Wait 30 days"
Complaint: "My wife is going to die if she can't get her green card", Answer "Wait 30 days"
I'm seriously going to have to write some serious hate mail to some government types. I think both of my Senators need to hear about this, as well as my Representative, maybe the President, the Director of the agency, etc. This crap is ridiculous. I am seriously at wit's end here. I just don't even know what else to do or say....