[kleslie]

Hello everyone! Just need some help regarding getting a US Police Check. My partner (sponsor) lived in the US for a year and we got an email from IMMI asking for his Australian and US police checks.

So my questions are:

How long does it take to get the US police check?

We are only given 28 days to send documents, what if the US police check is not ready? Can we pass just an application form for the US one and just say that we will give it to them once it arrives?

We still dont know where or how to get the US one, ill research after this! But if anyone has any info/advice, it will be much appreciated! Thank you!

 

[Savage_Flame]

I am not too familiar with the US police clearance process, but from reading posts on here they can sometimes take a while if you are not in the country where you are obtaining the police check from. In your case, apparently you may also need a state check too depending on which part of the US.

Someone else may be able to add further information on the US police check and state check.

In regards to the 28 day timeframe - once you pay for the police check, you should recieve some sort of receipt or confirmation of payment. You can then upload this into your online application. I believe there is even a button you can select as evidence that is called something along the lines of:

character assessment - evidence of intention to obtain

The DIBP understand sometimes it can take longer for overseas police checks to process and arrive, so as long as you show you have paid for it, then they understand there is not much else you can do until it arrives.

 

[tijanaoc]

Has the sponsor lived in the US in the last year? If not, then it would only be FBI check that would be required, not state police checks. The link with info for obtaining FBI check is here https://www.fbi.gov/services/cjis/identity-history-summary-checks (assuming he is not a green card holder or US citizen, and therefore has to go directly through the FBI). Yes, it takes a while - a few months. There is no receipt of payment that you can submit, since the payment isn't processed until a week before you get the results in the mail. So what we did for proof that we submitted it (required within the 28 day timeframe they've given you) was take pictures of all the completed forms (fingerprint form was also date-stamped by the police station that took our fingerprints) just before we mailed them off to the FBI by registered post (so we also had a receipt and proof of delivery to FBI). You can then upload all that under "character assessment - evidence of intention to obtain" as Savage Flame said above.

 

[tijanaoc]

Just to add, although the FBI instructions say they will accept the fingerprint form on plain paper, I have heard some people's applications got rejected, so it is recommended to print the form on card stock before taking it to a police station to get your prints done. Also recommended to take two sets of prints, in case one is smudged and they can't get a read from them. Have also heard people's prints getting rejected for this, and if that happens you have to send another application and another set of prints and start the clock again. So it's good to cover all your bases at the start.