Can I Change My US Consulate Interview Location

Tanya Freedman, CEO Connetics USA International Nurse Recruitment Agency: Oh, this is interesting because I think this is the one of the kind of things that people might be thinking of. Assuming that the visa bulletin is on current status. Is there such a thing as a faster US Embassy like a non busy consulate that can issue the ID faster than the busier ones? Or it is it always depend on the priority date?

Michael Hammond, Immigration Lawyer: Well, I'm assuming that Dyey is asking about if his priority date is current, because obviously the visa bulletin is not current and no expectation it will become current. So if your priority date is current, can you go to any Consulate of your choice? And the answer is NO. You can always go to the consulate where you were, where you're living and you're born, you're a citizen of that.

There are also consulates you can go to, based upon I have some status in that particular country. I'm here on a two year work visa, I may be a resident of that country, I may be a citizen of that country, you can, but you simply can't form shop.

Also, you have to determine you have to advise what consulate you want to go to back when your I-140 file. And even though you can change that, changing consulates generally is complicated, time consuming, often fraught with dealing get the paperwork, they only got part of the paper work, they got you but not your spouse, they got the two kids but not you or your spouse.

So changing consulate is generally a bad idea. So back to just the easy answer for Dyey is you cannot form shop, you can't pick a consulate simply because one's going to be faster.

I would like to add that because of retrogression, it is really critical that you pick the correct consulate for you from the beginning. So if we know this process is gonna take 18 months to 20 months before you get an interview, and you're gonna file today, and you're working in the UAE today.

If we were a year ago, we would have said, let's pick the consulate UAE because that's probably where you're still going to be. If you're on an assignment that only has a year left, and you know, it's not renewable, then you don't want to pick the UAE is your consulate, you want to pick back in Manila or wherever you're from as your consulate.

So there's a little more selection process and thought that needs to go into the consulate at the I-140 selection based on what you expect your current and future employment and resident status to be. So work with your case manager on that.