USCIS Case Finder I When Does My Visa Expire?
In this short video, immigration attorney, Andres Mejer thanks everyone for the wonderful response to our video on “How To Locate Your USCIS Case Status”
Then he briefly explains how to easily and quickly find out when your visa expires when you are visiting the United States on a temporary or non-immigrant visa.
Transcript (Transcripción):
Andres Mejer: Welcome to the English version of our radio program, Para Ser Legal. It’s great to be back with you guys. I’ve been almost a month since we’ve had in live video show with all with all the holidays in the past month. They offer all on Mondays. I have not had the time to be able to sit and talk and tell you about what’s been going on in immigration. We’ve published lots of content. You guys have had some great questions. Thank you very much. Really happy with the success of our How to Find Your USCIS case status video. Lot of great questions were asked on that video and that video alone. We’ve got over 13000 views and I look forward to answering some of those questions that were posted there right here on this show.
Andres Mejer: A lot of you. asked with respect to that video, how do I know what my case status is, what’s going on, particularly when USCIS always says petition under review.
Andres Mejer: I check every day or I check once a week or I check once a month. But it doesn’t change. What do I do if I applied timely? But my visa is about to expire? So let me rephrase the question. Imagine I’m from Venezuela. I entered the United States as a tourist. USCIS gave me six months to stay in the United States.
Andres Mejer: Within that six month period, I applied for a green card or a permanent legal status of one kind or another.
Andres Mejer: And the petition is pending and pending and pending. I’m not getting an answer.
Andres Mejer: And my visa is about to expire. What do I need to do? How can I get an answer? Tell me. So that’s the question and that’s the scenario. But first of all, you need to know when your visa expires. So take a look at your passport. Look for the stamp that when you enter the United States, usually there’s a date by when you need to leave. It will be an oval you’ll see on the outside. USCIS or Customs Border Patrol, and in it usually is written B1, B2, F one student visa, J. 1 au pair or an exchange student., H1 is an employment visa. So depending on how you entered the United States, there will be some letters there and below it usually is a date. That date is the date that you’re supposed to depart by. But there isn’t always a date. Sometimes it’s not there. I’ve talked about that in just a moment. So if you didn’t enter but you’re you have an ESTA visa. You don’t know what an ESTA visa is. ESTA visa is by virtue of a country by which you’re born or the you’re citizen. Let’s say the U.K., Spain, Portugal,nowadays Chile.. It used to be Argentina. It used to be Brazil. Both Argentina and Brazil have lost that status over the years. So basically what that means is you present your visa, you present your passport and you automatically get 90 days. So your passport will not indicate a date on it because it’s all it’s 90 for everybody every time. If you don’t have an ESTA visa or the passport doesn’t have a date on it, you can go to Customs and Border Patrol‘s website. It’s CBP dot gov backslash i 94. Make sure you have your passport with you. You can get up here. Five, you look at your last five years of travel history, you can get a copy of your most recent I- 94. What’s I ninety four? It’s your entry or departure record that every immigrant is giving when they legally enter the United States. It used to be a white, small document that you put in your passport when you entered. Well, CBP, Customs Border Patrol no longer gives you the white paper. Instead, they give you the stamp on the passport. I don’t know why they ever changed it. The government never explains what they do, you know, putting the stamp on a passport. It’s so much easier. But teh I-94 is your entry record. So let me give an example. Let’s say you lost your passport. Let’s say you put it in your back pocket. You wash the jeans and Now got washed out and it’s all fill me and you can’t see what it says. Go to Customs, Border Patrol and you can get your five year record or your most recent entry. If it’s from a long time ago, you might have what’s called a FOYA request, which is a Freedom of Information Act. That’s my act. That’s a much more complicated process. CBP, you can do it on your own. Nice and simple if you need to ask for a FOYA request. Well, there’s lots of litigation about that. Contact an attorney because chances are you have a slightly more complicated, more nuanced situation.
Andres Mejer: So, once again, thank you so much for watching today. Go ahead and share your thoughts in the comments below. And don’t forget to subscribe on YouTube. And I look forward to answering more of your questions next week.
