First of all, I wanted to thank all the members of this forum for their insight and support. This road did not feel as lonely as we all traveled it together.
When an I-485 is accepted at the Service Center, requests for FD-258 FBI fingerprint checks, fingerprint fees, and G-325A consular background checks are made by USCIS. Responses to these requests come back to USCIS and must be matched up with the appropriate files held in staging. File Maintenance "file connects" these responses to the corresponding files.
My wife and I had our passports stamped after a 6 hour ordeal that started at 8:30 a.m. and ended at 2:30 p.m. Here are some tips based on what we experienced,
1. For an 8:40 appointment, get there before 8 if at all possible. They were not checking appointment timings, so people with 9/10 a.m. appointments were ahead of us in the line. All they care is that you have an appointment for that day.
Here is a question from our community:
My husband and I have our N400 petition pending for almost 18 months. We passed our interview in July 2007 and had our 2nd fingerprinting 2 weeks ago. We were also informed that we have been cleared from background check. We have to leave for an international assignment in December and would like to understand the steps we need to take so it does not impact/disrupt our naturalization process, in case we do not get called for oath by then.