THE APPOINTMENTAs I mentioned, my appointment was at the Los Angeles center. I don't know how things work at other centers--probably quite similarly, but I'm going to get specific in case the details might help anyone else.
I aimed to arrive early because I was dealing with mid-afternoon traffic and pedestrians in downtown Los Angeles. Navigation and parking can be tricky. They have a garage but the area for self-parking was not immediately obvious or easy to get to.
When I got to the lobby, they had two banks of elevators; one went to floors 2-10, and the other went to floors 11-20. The Application Center is on the second floor. When I went to get on the correct elevator, one of the building's employees redirected me to the desk in the lobby, saying that I needed to sign in.
I went over and they asked me who I was there to see. I was never given anyone's name, so after a confused exchange where they insisted they needed a name, I told her that my appointment was at the Visa Application Center. She said she would call and have them send someone down to get me, and then she looked at my ID and had me sign in.
After a few minutes, a security guard came down to get me and escort me upstairs. When we got on the elevator I asked her about it, and she said that they let some people come up but otherwise they escort people. It turns out, also, that she was not one of the building's guards, she worked specifically for VFS. At this point it was becoming very clear that VFS was very interested in security.
When we arrived in the lobby, there was a man already waiting for me. He introduced himself, confirmed that I was his appointment, and then immediately said, "Can I please see the receipt for the... $1,700." I produced it, wondering how many fakers attempt to get into their offices, and he was satisfied but he went straight on to the next thing.
They had me take a seat while he looked at my passport and the signed forms from the completed visa application. He went away and came back with a blank form that I'd already filled out in preparation for the appointment so I took that out and gave it to him. (I believe it's one of the forms from Visa4UK that they ask you to fill out and have ready at your appointment.)
He left me in the lobby while he went and entered some preliminary information into the computer with what I had given him. Some actor in need of a visa for somewhere was in the lobby with his personal assistant at the time. What up, LA. I eavesdropped on him talking about his TV-show character's story arc.
The guy came out to get me again, and then they opened the door to a small room which sort of resembled the room in the video I linked earlier, which was about how great and fancy VFS is, with their British pillows and complimentary cookies. Before I was allowed to enter the room, the security guard who had escorted me wanded me and had me open my purse so she could have a glance. Inside the room there were Union Jack pillows. No cookies. They offered me a bottle of water but I declined.
The first guy was at the desk, and a second guy was seated in one of the chairs; I was informed that they have two people present when they do settlement visas. A third guy popped in and out as well, but mostly the door was closed.
Everything was handled with kid gloves--mainly in how they treated the process, but also in regards to how they talked to me. (I think the assumption is that because I paid for this expensive service of theirs, I must be some kind of wealthy, high-flying, "I would like to speak to a manager and I expect to get what I want" type--honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if that's how most of their clientele is, especially because this was Los Angeles, but that is not my lifestyle or personality.) Anyway, yeah, they explained everything they were doing as they were doing it, repeatedly reassured me that it was "not an interview," etc. And it was all very check-listy.
Despite all of that, I still didn't feel like they explained things super clearly in terms of the timeline and/or the things that would happen following my appointment. I probably should have made more of an effort to ask questions, but the answers to the questions I did ask were sort of vague and/or sort of "we can't make guarantees" disclaimers. More on timelines and these kinds of details in the next section of my write-up, "Post-Appointment," which is in the next post in this thread.
Anyway, yeah, so I had all of my documents and they asked me to write down the address to which I wanted everything sent after they were done with it, and they had their checklists and they prepared their labels, folders, and mailing envelopes for everything I was going to be giving them.
They explained that they were going to scan everything and send it electronically to the office in Sheffield. Once Sheffield confirmed with VFS that everything had been received and it was legible and clear, VFS was going to 2-day ship all of the documents back to me.
My passport, however, was a different matter. I didn't really understand this until the appointment, but the visa goes in your passport. (I know... this is kind of a huge "duh.") So, you have two options. You can leave your passport with them, and if your visa application is approved, they put it in there and send it to you with next-day shipping. Or, you can take your passport with you, probably in case you're a wealthy high-flyer with an international lifestyle and a packed schedule, and if you get approved you return to the center so they can put the visa in there.
I opted to leave my passport at the Application Center and have them mail it to me, because once my lease was up (only a month after my appointment), I was going to be departing Los Angeles to begin my "goodbye tour" in the US.
Eventually we went down a list of items and I basically destroyed all of the carefully compiled evidence sleeves with title pages that I had created based on the guide I linked to earlier (
https://www.migrate.org.uk/spouse-visa-uk-2018/#spouse-visa-uk-document-checklist [nofollow] ). They told me what they needed, I pulled it out and handed it over to them and they put it in a folder of their own. They explained that this was just what they did to organize things on their end; they did not receive any "official" training from Sheffield. Their list seemed to cover documentation for all kinds of situations, not all of which were relevant to me. Apparently this bit takes the longest but I was well-organized so it moved fairly quickly.
Interestingly, they did not ask for the passport photos I had for myself or my partner, which the guide we were following said we'd need. They also didn't need photocopies of my passport, but they took the photocopies of my partner's passport. (I had photocopied all of the pages of both of our passports.) They weren't sure if it would be needed but we agreed it is better to have it and not need it than the other way around.
They asked if I had any loose photos or tickets, etc.; they said they could not submit something that wasn't the size of a standard sheet of paper--I'm guessing (especially based on all their special fancy premium services) that they would have been able to scan and print them for me. But I was well-prepared with 70-something pages of meticulously compiled evidence. (My partner and I have been together for 9 years and as I mentioned earlier we had already started the US immigration process for him, so I was no stranger to the requirements of "evidence.") They didn't look through the evidence, they just tucked it in with everything else.
Finally they asked if I had anything else I might like to submit, but I said no. Their checklist had said something about airline bookings, so for a second I thought, "Should I ask them to print my itinerary for my already-booked flight to England? Would that make Sheffield go, 'Oh, wow, we gotta get this visa done!'" But then I was like, "No, they are not going to care." So I didn't say anything.
Side note: they recommend that you do not purchase any tickets before you have your visa, and I would suggest you follow that advice. I bought my ticket before I had my visa for a couple of reasons: I hadn't researched the process as thoroughly as I should have, and we thought it'd be cool if I arrived on our 9-year anniversary. At a certain point during this whole process I had to accept that it was very possible that I might not have my visa in time, I would be kind of stranded in the US waiting for my visa, and I would be out the money I'd spent on my ticket. I got pretty lucky. Be informed, be proactive in your planning, and again, if you can avoid doing this in the same sort of "by the seat of your pants" way that I did, I would recommend that.
With all the documentation-gathering finished, they took me to an office across the hall for the biometrics. More Union Jack pillows. (Still no cookies.) For this part of it there were once again two people present.
They entered my passport into the system, and they told me they have to have two-person confirmation on the details. They were super-serious about it. At a couple different points they asked me to give my full name and date of birth, and then one guy entered my passport information into the computer and the other checked it and read it off to the first guy, who then confirmed it. They would confirm things twice out loud as they went, and after a bit of this they told me this was required, because we were on camera and everything was being recorded. It sounded like he meant that it was both an audio and visual recording.
After all of the information was entered, one guy bid me goodbye and the rest of my appointment was handled by one person. He took my fingerprints and then had me sit in front of a white board so my picture could be taken. This bit was weird--he had a nice DSLR camera that he'd hooked up to the laptop computer on his desk, and then he like... held it up in front of me with one hand while looking at and using the computer with the other hand. Could they not afford a tripod? Without cuing me or anything he started taking pictures and the last two or three times he asked if I could open my eyes wider, which was a direction I have never received. I had no idea how the pictures were going to turn out. (I found out later that the picture they went with was kind of awful, as the story usually goes, and now it's on my Biometric Residence Permit and printed in my passport. Yay...)
Someone came in and dropped off my copies of the shipping information and shortly after that they gave me a receipt proving I had submitted biometrics, and they told me I was all set.
So I went out, got my parking validated, and was amused by their assumption that I'd utilized the valet car service. All in all, I was there for one hour and 12 minutes.
Later that day I received emails from UPS with tracking information for the two packages I would receive from them at some point down the road: my documents, and my passport.
Read on for the next segments, "Post-Appointment" and "Conclusion."
