Blog

This article will cover the entry and exit requirements for U.S. citizens visiting the Philippines as a tourist. This article covers quite a bit of information so it has been written in a five-part series with the first part covering the initial requirements to enter and exit the Philippines without extending or requiring a waiver.

St. Luke’s Medical Center Extension Clinic (SLEC) now offers online registration for those applying for a U.S. Immigrant Visa. This online service is to aid in the registration process and is expected to reduce registration time by having most of the applicant’s information ready upon arrival at the registration area.

A Consular Report of Birth Abroad (CRBA), is an official record of U.S. citizenship issued to a person under age 18 who was born abroad to United States citizen parent(s) and acquired citizenship at birth. Schools, the Social Security Agency, and other institutions throughout the United States accept it and give it the same credence they give to birth certificates issued by state authorities in the United States.

Many people ask how much cash they can bring into the Philippines. There actually is no limit at all. You can carry all the cash you want as long as you declare anything over US $10000. There is no tax and nobody will take the money away from you (unless you get robbed in the parking lot).

All travelers with or without visa will be asked to complete an I-94 Arrival/Departure Record form before landing in the United States. Travelers without a visa use the green form and travelers with a visa use the white from.

The National Visa Center (NVC) assigns each immigrant petition a case number. The NVC case number has three letters followed by ten numbers. The three letters are an abbreviation for the overseas embassy or consulate that will process the immigrant visa case (for example, JAK for Jakarta, MNL for Manila).

All visa applicants, regardless of age, need to complete a medical examination at the St. Luke’s Medical Center Extension Clinic (SLMCEC) before the visa interview. Applicants are advised to have their medical examinations done at least one week before their interview appointment at the U.S. Embassy in Manila.

One of the things that slow down K-1 Fiancée visa applicants is getting the passport photo and signatures from the alien fiancée abroad.  Back on November 1 2005 the USCIS released a memo to it's Service Center Directors instructing them not to issue an RFE (Request for Evidence) for a K-1 petition that is missing the […]

In theory, yes, but in practice, not really. The K3 has been obsolete for several years, and if you submit a K3 nonimmigrant visa petition it will likely be changed to the CR1/IR1 Immigrant visa.

Chinese birth certificates are available in the form of notarial certificates (Chu Sheng Gong Zheng Shu or Chu Sheng Zheng Ming Shu).
While some notarial birth certificates will list stepparents or adoptive parents along with natural parents this is not always the case. In some cases the certificates will list only the natural parents covering up an adoption.