The tale of a lost I-171h- an immigration fairy tale

Once upon a time there was a king and queen whose family had US government pre-approval to bring home one orphan from Ethiopia. The family received the glorious news of this pre-approval in February in the form of the much sought after I-171h. The family went happily throughout their days knowing that the local USCIS office had sent news of this approval to the National Visa Center, the new clearinghouse for the sending of these approvals around the world. Little did the family know that the NVC had other plans for them. The family found a baby, and the courts decided that the family and the baby should be together forever. The family was so excited to be able to go get the baby. One day an email arrived from their fairy god-agency that they had a date with the US embassy in Ethiopia to finalize all the rest of the paperwork. However, the agency also indicated that evil was afoot and that there were no approvals waiting for the family in Ethiopia. So the queen began making phone calls and soon realized that getting a competent helpful person on the phone was like searching for a mythical unicorn. For 2 days, the queen tried to make sense of what had happened- the local USCIS office resent all the paperwork again but still no one could find it. The fairy god-agency called and said that the approval (also known as a Visa 37 cable) was sent to Ethiopia. There was rejoining in the kingdom, but there was also bad news. The visa 37 cable had expired fingerprints with it- even though the king and queen both had current approvals, including fingerprints. Oh what should they do- more phone calls of course. Then after 3 days of calling a miracle happened. One person at the NVC noticed that the name of the petitioner was the king, but the queen’s date of birth was listed as the king’s- clearly causing much confusion for all. That explains why the paperwork they sent was expired- it was all for China from the princess’s adoption last year. Of course, finding the error was not enough to solve the problem- the NVC still could not confirm that it had sent the new, correct visa 37 cable to Ethiopia and the family was ready to depart on their journey in less than 48 hours. Enter the brave soldiers of the US Senate and House of Representatives. They had the magic powers to slay the incompetence at the NVC and get the correct visa 37 cable sent. The king and queen got word from the soldier’s local office staff that everything is in order. And joy reigned in the kingdom.

The moral of the story is- once you get a referral you need to get confirmation that the visa 37 cable has been received and if not begin work to fix it immediately. I know at least 10 families who have lived through this fairy tale (one of whom who had to try to get it fixed while in Ethiopia and one who found out is was a problem for the first time the day before their embassy appointment) Also- if you are dealing with it put your senators and members of Congress on speed dial- you are going to need them.