The National Visa Center is basically a go-between between USCIS here in the United States and the US embassies and consulates abroad. The National Visa Center’s role is to collect documents that are required for the interview phase of the case for visas that will be happening at a US embassy or consulate abroad.

There’s a lot of people who are confused about fiancé visas and what the National Visa Center does with fiancé visas. For fiancé visas, it’s different than with spouse visas. The National Visa Center is not in charge of collecting documents. There is no portal for spouse visas.

There’s something called a CEAC portal where you upload your documents and fill out an online application. That doesn’t exist with the National Visa Center for fiancé visas.

The role of the National Visa Center with fiancé visas is that they assign a case number for that US embassy or consulate and they hold on to the file until the US embassy or consulate abroad lets them know they have appointments and interview spaces available.

They’ll notify NVC that they have this many available for fiancé visas and will request that they send those files.

That’s really the extent of the role of the National Visa Center for fiancé visas: assigning a case number and holding on to that file until the US embassy or consulate lets the National Visa Center know to go ahead and forward it to them.

With everything that’s going on with COVID, there’s a much longer delay for interviews to be scheduled for fiancé visas and so, the National Visa Center has just been holding on to those fiancé visa cases in countries where there is a longer wait. You might receive notifications from the NVC that let you know they’re still holding your file.

Right now there’s nothing you need to do, just wait until you receive a notification from the US embassy or consulate abroad letting you know you can take the next steps on your case.