HELP! Need advice on a couple of ??'s

First question, does anybody know if the british consolate in L.A. will be open on monday (April 21) considering it is a bank holiday in the U.K. does that have anything to do with that?

and.....how important is it that i have my husbands payslips?  i mean, i have a letter from his work saying that he is employed there and has been for 2 years.  The problem is that he sent me his original birth certificate and his payslips priority mail about 2 weeks ago, and i still haven't gotten it.  i'm wondering if it got lost.  there is no way for them to track it, and i don't know what to do.  when ian was here, i made a copy of his birth certificate and forgot to get it notarised, so i do have a copy (hoping that will work in case it is lost).  does anyone have any advice??

I suppse it depends, we need to know what kind of visa you are applying for and where, and what your situation is, really. If it's for a fiancee visa, I didn't have pay slips but had an official letter from his employer stating how long he had worked there, how much he made a year, that he was in good standing... and that was fine as far as proving he could support me financially. So that's all the advice I can offer right now, but let us know some more about your situation (and I'm sorry if you posted it elsewhere and I don't see it!) - and maybe some other people can pipe in with some advice. Good luck though! And as far as the embassy being open, best bet is to just call them, even if it's after hours they'd probably have a recorded message saying when opening hours are, but it's best to call them directly rather than getting that kind of advice second hand.

If you are applying for a spouse/settlement visa you do not need your husbands birth certificate. It did not say it was a requirement on the Bristish/USA Visa website and just to make sure we called the NYC consulate just to make sure and they said that we didn't need my husbands but we did need mine.

Hope this helps.

oops...sorry for being so vague
i am applying for a spouse visa.  i intend to go to the consolate on tuesday since monday is a british holiday.  i hope i have enough info for them.  i've read a lot of the posts here and i am extremely organised, except for the birth certificate and pay slips.  thanks so much for both of your advice!  i love this site...