National Visa Center (NVC) Processing Time

Tanya Freedman, CEO Connetics USA: How long does it normally take to receive a Document Qualified from the NVC? How do we know the normal time for the specific consulate we'll be making an interview with, my case consular is Mexico City.

Atty. Michael Hammond: But as I understand it, it's taken about three to four months to get DQ in most cases.

Mexico City, there was just a report recently that they were backlogged for over a year in interviews. I'm assuming that that data, combined all types of interviews, family interviews, employment-based, etc. I don't personally have anyone that I'm aware of who's gone through Mexico City as an RN recently. So I do not know whether the RN process, you know, the expedite for RNs, as a health care worker is faster than a year, but I would assume so.

Atty. Anshu Anand: I would like to add one thing, and it's not necessarily what anything that Mike has said, know a lot of people, I know a lot of you are seeing issues with, you know, even, you know, with the case being shipped from the USCIS to NVC, or getting the fee bill issued or getting DQ or getting the interview.

One of the other things that we are seeing in our office is just dealing with the CEAC portal, which is also causing some delays. The CEAC portal is basically the portal that accepts the Fee bill payment; it allows us to upload the documents, and the civil documents, and we are seeing that there are delays in that.

You know, like, like in our office, individuals would pay the fee bill, and then it would show that it's in process, and then weeks later, it's still in process, and then it gets rejected. And another thing that we're seeing is that you know, an individual submits their DS260. It gets accepted. And then weeks or months later, they get a letter saying that a deficiency notice from the NVC saying that the DS260 was never submitted.

We started compiling all of these issues in our office, and we actually sent the Department of State just a memo on this because it is this part of it is also causing a delay, which kind of effects everything else in the way. So I wanted to mention that as well.

Tanya: Thank you for adding that because that is something that we're seeing as well, across the board, where there are some delays and some, you know, anomalies.  They are very unusual delays that we're seeing right now.

Atty. Anshu: But I do want to make sure everyone understands that, like, the Department of State is aware of this. They are working with us on this. We've also reached out to AILA, which is the American Immigration Lawyers Association; they have liaisons that also work at the Department of State. So we're trying to, and also the AAIHR, which is an organization that also works with the Department of State on these issues.

So we're trying to work through different channels to address all these issues. Because, you know, like, obviously, they're causing delays, and they seem to be just technical delays, you know, so, so I did want to mention that.

Tanya: Thank you for mentioning that. Because, you know, Connetics is also a member of the AAIHR.

In addition to that, our nurse recruitment agency also as I mentioned earlier, we work with a lot of government affairs departments at various healthcare facilities as well. So if you are experiencing one of these, I would say kind of more unusual delays, which we'll be seeing currently is a lot of efforts in the United States to make sure that these are rectified and working through lots of channels here to try and solve this problem.