So here is the low down on where we are for paperwork on our adoption.

 

Danielle is now on her third request for employement verification work.  My question is really, how helpful is HR if it takes (hopefully) three times to provide a basic verification letter?  First one actually had someone elses name in the body of the better, so it mentioned Danielle in the first and last paragraph, but mentioned someone named Michelle in two other paragraphs. NICE!!  The second letter actually had Danielle's name but was not then notarized.  NICE!!  On top of it all they will not send the verification letter directly to Danielle they say they must send it to a third party.  In this case we have deemed the homestudy agency our third paryt even though they are not the ones that want the letter the letter is for China.  Danielle has been having to drive out of her way to retreive bad paperwork.  So we are now having our social worker contact Danielle's company directly and walking through the process with the woman (same woman each time).  Very frustraiting.

 

On the new required Child Abuse Registry/Police Background Checks.  We have received background checks from Idaho, Oregon and Washington so that takes care of the US.  We have requested my background check from Australia.  We have confirmation that Australia does not maintain a Child Abuse Registry but we have been recommended to receive a background check anyhow.  Generally a statement in the homestudy that simply states Australia does not maintain a Child Abuse Registry would suffice, but after contacting the USCIS, they recommended a background check as well.  The hoops for an Australian background check went a little like this.  Receive application through the Australian Federal Police by downloading, go to our bank and convert US funds to Australian dollars.  The Australian dollars has to be in cheque form and affiliated with an Australian bank.  So for an AUS$32 check it cost us roughly US$70 by the time the bank charges are included.  On top of it we Fedex'ed the cheque and application to Australia and for a mere cost of $65 we got it to Australia in 4 days.  So it cost a total of $130 and now we wait for a response.  Hopefully the application is correct and there will be no hold ups.  In the mean time we contacted an online chat group in Australia to ask about the application as online the process is supposed to only take 15 business days.  Our contacts have said anywhere from one week to 5, so we have our fingers crossed for one week. 

 

Once we get the background check and Danielle's verification letter we will have our homestudy done.  Then it is off to applying for our I800 (immigration paperwork and Federal fingerprinting).  My understanding that the I800 process is a long process as well.  So our timeline of having all paperwork completed by November 1st may be cutting it close.

 

We will keep you posted.