The Drivers License
Well, this is not particularly immigration related but it has turned into one of those experiences that have been a royal pain. Suzie, like so many folks living in large metropolitan cities had little need of a car so she had never bothered to get licensed to drive in the UK. Living in a small almost rural US City it is almost a necessity to have your license to drive.
So... here is what we went through starting with a couple of months after we got married and she got in the country.
First we had to get her a learners permit. Study Study Study, take the online exam multiple times until she has it down so we take the time. Then after digging extensively through the website looking for any gotchas for non-citizens and not finding any we head down to the local DMV for her to take her written test. We walk in the door and in sun faded coffee stained glory that looks like it has been there so long they built the building around it is a notice stating that non-citizens can only go to a single branch in the north of the state about 40 miles away.... NICE. Ok, no biggie we have the morning off so we head out for the branch she can take the test at. She goes in, I go to move the car since I parked in a bad spot and as I am walking up to the building she comes storming out with tears in her eyes. They had refused to let her take the exam because she did not have her permanent resident card.
She has a marriage certificate. She has all the letters saying her paperwork is filed. The processing time for the card is going to take another 4 months if we are lucky and they can't let her take her learners permit test. So at this point she can not legally get behind the wheel to learn a basic skill required to maintain ones independence in a small city with almost zero public transportation options. Seriously, once she got her card (meaning her right to actually hold a job because her work permit actually took longer than her residence card) she tried the bus. It took her 2 hours to get 5 miles down the road because she had to change twice and buses only ran every 30 minutes or so.
So it will be December (we got married in July) before she can get her learners permit. So, life in retail and busy bees trying to make ends meet find little time for driving lessons for the next several months... almost a year in fact before I finally have enough of chauffeuring her back and forth to work that I make her drive enough to get into position to take her road test. In fact we get to this past June... last month. Almost two years after she got here.
And we discover something great. In order to take your road test you must have documentation of your legal residence time being greater than 90 days. So we wound up running hard up against her permanent resident card expiration due to it having temporary status.... permanent temporary. Folks you just can't make this stuff up and don't hurt yourself trying. Our Government at work is something else indeed.
So the magic day roles around. She schedules a road test time and takes with her multiple forms of identification which she also took with her to get the learners. One of the required pieces turns out to be the old SS card. Which she has. Only she actually has two of them because DHS screwed up her name on her Residence card. SS got it right but for banking and other paper work niceties she had to get the card changed to match the DHS paperwork despite the fact they admitted they made a mistake. Why not just get it fixed? We tried. They had to have the card. Only... you have to have the card in your possession to do things like leave and enter the country, apply for bank accounts, apply for jobs etc... and the paper work for correcting names was running (any guesses????) Yep about 6 months behind. Anyway she finds the first SS Card but cannot locate the second one. However she does locate the paper work associated with the issuing of the second card and takes that.
No Joy. She can't take her test because she does not have a second page of the letter from the second card paper work. No indication of a second page. No cut off paragraph. No page number etc... but denied anyway. Marriage certificate, Permanent resident card and an issued SS card that happend to have been updated not to mention all the paper work documenting that whole fiasco AND they had already issued her a lerners permit with all the same documentation requirements... had in fact issued it with the card she did have.
Anyway, we finally manage to lay hands on the second SS card that matches her residence card and she takes the test a week before the date on the residence card would have disqualified her from being able to take it and it would have been several more months before she could have tried again. Just another little F(*)& you for someone trying to do it the right way. Just made our day let me tell you. At least she was allowed to take her road test at the local DMV instead of heading out to the other location. The faded sign was no longer in evidence and there still was no information on the website about it... JOY.
Anyway keep your eyes peeled for the next round of fun. Removal of temporary status. Possible interviews, more biometrics since her fingerprints might have changed. After all, foreigners are evidently prone to acid washing their finger tips to fool DHS... oh wait... we don't want to fool them... WE JUST WANT TO BE DONE WITH THEM. Jeebus. Another 90 bucks and a 3 hours round trip to get her fingerprints taken a 3rd time and $600+ to issue her a card without an expiration date... you know one that puts the PERMANENT in permanent resident card. Hey, its expensive plastic!
So... here is what we went through starting with a couple of months after we got married and she got in the country.
First we had to get her a learners permit. Study Study Study, take the online exam multiple times until she has it down so we take the time. Then after digging extensively through the website looking for any gotchas for non-citizens and not finding any we head down to the local DMV for her to take her written test. We walk in the door and in sun faded coffee stained glory that looks like it has been there so long they built the building around it is a notice stating that non-citizens can only go to a single branch in the north of the state about 40 miles away.... NICE. Ok, no biggie we have the morning off so we head out for the branch she can take the test at. She goes in, I go to move the car since I parked in a bad spot and as I am walking up to the building she comes storming out with tears in her eyes. They had refused to let her take the exam because she did not have her permanent resident card.
She has a marriage certificate. She has all the letters saying her paperwork is filed. The processing time for the card is going to take another 4 months if we are lucky and they can't let her take her learners permit test. So at this point she can not legally get behind the wheel to learn a basic skill required to maintain ones independence in a small city with almost zero public transportation options. Seriously, once she got her card (meaning her right to actually hold a job because her work permit actually took longer than her residence card) she tried the bus. It took her 2 hours to get 5 miles down the road because she had to change twice and buses only ran every 30 minutes or so.
So it will be December (we got married in July) before she can get her learners permit. So, life in retail and busy bees trying to make ends meet find little time for driving lessons for the next several months... almost a year in fact before I finally have enough of chauffeuring her back and forth to work that I make her drive enough to get into position to take her road test. In fact we get to this past June... last month. Almost two years after she got here.
And we discover something great. In order to take your road test you must have documentation of your legal residence time being greater than 90 days. So we wound up running hard up against her permanent resident card expiration due to it having temporary status.... permanent temporary. Folks you just can't make this stuff up and don't hurt yourself trying. Our Government at work is something else indeed.
So the magic day roles around. She schedules a road test time and takes with her multiple forms of identification which she also took with her to get the learners. One of the required pieces turns out to be the old SS card. Which she has. Only she actually has two of them because DHS screwed up her name on her Residence card. SS got it right but for banking and other paper work niceties she had to get the card changed to match the DHS paperwork despite the fact they admitted they made a mistake. Why not just get it fixed? We tried. They had to have the card. Only... you have to have the card in your possession to do things like leave and enter the country, apply for bank accounts, apply for jobs etc... and the paper work for correcting names was running (any guesses????) Yep about 6 months behind. Anyway she finds the first SS Card but cannot locate the second one. However she does locate the paper work associated with the issuing of the second card and takes that.
No Joy. She can't take her test because she does not have a second page of the letter from the second card paper work. No indication of a second page. No cut off paragraph. No page number etc... but denied anyway. Marriage certificate, Permanent resident card and an issued SS card that happend to have been updated not to mention all the paper work documenting that whole fiasco AND they had already issued her a lerners permit with all the same documentation requirements... had in fact issued it with the card she did have.
Anyway, we finally manage to lay hands on the second SS card that matches her residence card and she takes the test a week before the date on the residence card would have disqualified her from being able to take it and it would have been several more months before she could have tried again. Just another little F(*)& you for someone trying to do it the right way. Just made our day let me tell you. At least she was allowed to take her road test at the local DMV instead of heading out to the other location. The faded sign was no longer in evidence and there still was no information on the website about it... JOY.
Anyway keep your eyes peeled for the next round of fun. Removal of temporary status. Possible interviews, more biometrics since her fingerprints might have changed. After all, foreigners are evidently prone to acid washing their finger tips to fool DHS... oh wait... we don't want to fool them... WE JUST WANT TO BE DONE WITH THEM. Jeebus. Another 90 bucks and a 3 hours round trip to get her fingerprints taken a 3rd time and $600+ to issue her a card without an expiration date... you know one that puts the PERMANENT in permanent resident card. Hey, its expensive plastic!
Comments
Thank you for sharing your K1 experience ... because right now I am going through this process, I arrived in the month of April 2008. There are a lot of questions I need to find answers...anyway your blog gave or I better say revealed most of em... like how much time it gonna take ... I should have found your blog earlier... :(