Visotors visa

[vsdj]

[IMG]Hello,

I had a question about visitors visa. My parents have a 10 year visitors visa. Is it true that these days, parents travelling to USA get only 3 months of visitors visa at the port of entry?

I would appreciate if anyone could answer my question?

Thanks.

[ramkumarkoditala]

I dont think so.... but generally it is 3-6 months... but all depends on officer @ POE

I saw one of the post in this forum requesting for 6months when they were given 3 months initially (I think they were checking passport after the I94 and requested the officer for 6 months and granted)

I will search and post the link to that thread


HTH
RK

[VisaChief001]

If in your application the requested times is 3 months, ask only for 3 months at POE if they ask you how long you wanted to stay in US.
If the POE did not ask you how long you wanted to stay in US and give you entry upto 6 months, enjoy it. But never take it granted you will get six months all the time because some body got 6 months in the past
Do not ask for more time than you requested at getting your visa.

POE Officer will determine your stay in US.

[ramkumarkoditala]

If in your application the requested times is 3 months, ask only for 3 months at POE. Do not ask for more than you requested to get the visa.

POE Officer will determine your stay in US.

Do does it mean that, they can ask for 6 months if it was specified as 6 months application and given less than that?
Thx
RK

[SuCo]

VisaChief I disagree with you,
Once you get a 10yr multiple entry or 2yr multiple entry... POE officer has no way to know what you had asked for when you applied for the visa...
All you would have is the visa on your passport....
Therfore even if you asked for 2 months at the time of getting the visa you can very well ask for 6mths at the POE...
Usually POE officer are good about that... They know that when you are travelling 24hrs to get to a place 2 months is also less... they usually grant 6 months... if they are new to this you can request them to give you 6months and say that you are planning on leaving before that but this is just in case...I have had friend's parents request POE officer to give them 6months visa even when they had asked for 1mth visa at the interview..

[andyargs]

Suco,

What u said is good if the person is not appearing for another visa interview. VO will determine the credibility of the applicant based on previous visits to US. If u had said 2 months during the interview , got 6 months at POE, stayed for 6 months, the person's credibility is affected. So bottom line , its better to say 6 months during the interview which by the way will not affect the chances of getting the visa.

[HurricaneBay]

Visachief,

I have to completely disagree with you on this one. When my in-laws got the visa for first time, they requested only 2 months on DS156. At the POE, they were not even asked anything and were given 6 month I-94. They left on the last of the I-94 expiry. After few months they got 10 yr multiple entry without breaking sweat and they entered the country at a different POE. The officer asked how many months they want to stay and they said 6 months. So the I-94 was stamped for 6 months. As I said before, one has to be careful and watch what they ask for only at the consulate. Once the sacred stamp is placed on the passport, POE is a breeze as long as there are no security concerns (as in the case of all our parents/in-laws).

It is perfectly legal to change your mind after you get the stamp as to how long you want to stay. If it were not legal, then why would the laws provide for vistor visa extension? According to you, this should be illegal since one cannot change their mind in terms of duration of stay.

vsdj,

Bottomline is that if your parents are entering via popular POEs like JFK, LAX, ORD, SFO, etc., chances are they will be given a 6 month I-94 automatically. However, tell your parents to explicitly ask the officer for 6 month visit. I have personally experienced no issues with that and there are at least 10 families I know of whose parents/in-laws followed the above and all stayed for 6months to 12 months (with extensions) without issue.

[HurricaneBay]

andyargs,

"So bottom line , its better to say 6 months during the interview which by the way will not affect the chances of getting the visa."


Unfortunately saying that you want visa for 6 month will tremendously reduce your chance of getting visitor visa. Consular Officers have to go by the book and since visa approval process is so subjective, they have to factor in as much information provided by the applicant to determine the immigrant intent. So saying that you want to stay for 6 months as opposed to 2 months will pull your case more towards the immigrant intent column.

Another example. F1 is a strictly non-immigrant visa and if you were going for F1 interview and you say that you will not come back after studies, they will deny the visa. If you say you will come back, it will increase the chance of visa approval, although COs know statistically 99% of students never return, at least immediately after studies. So you have to be very careful what you say at the consulate and everything can be used againt you, since by law COs are supposed to assume immigrant intent and the onus is on the applicant to disprove that.

As far as the length of stay you ask for at consulate vs POE, I am just copy-pasting my thoughts from my previous post.

It is perfectly legal to change your mind after you get the stamp as to how long you want to stay. If it were not legal, then why would the laws provide for vistor visa extension? According to you, this should be illegal since one cannot change their mind in terms of duration of stay.

[andyargs]

I don't understand why saying 6 months will be an immigration intend If the POE people knows that its tough to tour in two months, VO will also know that. The question of immigration intend will arise only when the person is not able to show positive ties in the home country rather than saying he/she wants to stay 6 months.

[HurricaneBay]

andyargs,

Since visa approval process is very subjective and there is no clear cut formula used by COs, the only thing we can do is to analyze the approvals and rejections and see if there is anything common in such cases. Obviously my assumption that "asking for 6 months will reduce your chance of approval" is based on analysis of anecdotal evidence. For example, check out the original message in the following link:

http://www.immihelp.com/forum/showthread.php?t=16051

If your relatives have very strong ties like current govt. job, unmarried daughter living at home, etc. then probably other things like this will be overlooked. But in absense of such very strong ties, it pays to raise as few red flags as possible.

Again, you seem to think it is wrong to ask for one time period during interview and ask for a different time period of stay it at POE, but it is perfectly legal to change your mind.

[andyargs]

It all depends on the situation of the applicant as you said and also its perfectly legal to change ur mind. But my point was it will lower ur credibility.

[SuCo]

Thanks HurricaneBay for chiming in....
POE officer are really good about granting the visa... My inlaws have come to usa for 3 times so far - every time they are not even asked for how long do they need the visa. They are given 6months visa -they have come thru LAX/DEN/Chicago so far offcourse they return back within 3-4 months. If you returned back within the granted visa duration that is also a positive thing you maintain on your passport for the next interview...
BTW andyargs,
If at your first interview you ask for 2 months were granted 6months at POE and go back in say a year for more... they are not going to compare how much time you asked for and what you were granted!! They do not have that much time to spend when they have some 30-40 or even more cases to attend to... They would look at your dates of entry and exit from USA and compare that you were in and out of USA within the designated time... You coming back before or within the time is what they really look for...