We have seen on a few cases and we’ve also heard reports from other attorneys across the United States that this is happening to everyone who has a consular interview that’s supposed to happen in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico.

In the past, we have always gotten 30 to 45 days of notice which is really important because a lot of clients with that type of interview are living in the United States. They need to make travel arrangements to get to Mexico. They have to do background checks, fingerprint appointments, and medical exams. There are multiple things that have to be done to complete the interview.

What’s been happening lately is that some people are getting these notices in under two weeks, instead of having a month’s worth of time to prepare. Some clients receive the notice in as little as five days which is nearing the point where it’s almost impossible at a certain level to complete the required steps in that time frame.

This is a known issue. There was actually a notice released by the American Immigration Lawyers Association because it’s something that a lot of us are currently facing. Basically, the strategy they recommend is what we’ve been doing with these types of clients who are waiting for interviews in that specific location.

It’s really important to be prepared to move at a moment’s notice like letting your employer know that you’re going to need to travel potentially with very little notice.

Making sure that you’re ready and understand the whole process of exactly what you’ll need to bring, having your documentation in order, understanding how to get the fingerprint appointment so that all of those steps can happen as quickly as possible when you actually get the notice.

Of course, it’s super exciting if you’re going to get a notice that it’s time to go to your interview. But it’s not exciting if you don’t have enough time.

What appears to be happening is that if you miss the appointment or you can’t make the appointment, they are going to put you at the back of the line for rescheduling or give a pointless tip like getting online and reschedule. There’s nothing you can schedule online currently with that particular consulate.

It’s really important to try to preserve your spot when you get one. In some cases, that has even meant going to the interview without having completed all the required steps. Because even though you would be put in administrative processing, it’s still better than going back to the end of the line because of how long it took from when you were documentarily qualified to actually getting the interview.