This will probably be a fairly long post by Alien Spouse standards, so are you sitting comfortably? Good, then we shall begin.
I'm still waiting for my Social Security number, without which I cannot get a job, I have been waiting since the end of October so it's been three months now. The Doc suggested I give someone a call and see if we can find out what is going on, when last we asked about this we were told there was currently a delay of about fifteen weeks.
I looked up the Social Security website and found the section for immigrants. Essentially the system for immigrants is now that we apply for a SSN at the same time as our visas, and I particularly love the section on the website that explains why this is a better system, which states:
If you apply for a Social Security number (SSN) card when you apply for an immigrant visa, you can save yourself time and worry. If you use this process, you won't have to:
- Find a Social Security office near your new home;
- Go in person to the Social Security office;
- Apply for a Social Security number; or
- Wait for the Social Security number card to come in the mail.
Instead, the U.S. government will use the same information that you give to apply for an immigrant visa to apply for an SSN. Then, once you arrive in the U.S., you can expect your SSN card at your mailing address in about 3 weeks.
One less thing to worry about as you settle in your new country!
Hmmm... That sounds really sensible, until you've literally been sitting around for three months waiting for your SSN, and getting really quite worried about it. Particularly as you can't apply for a job, or open a bank account, or do anything else to "...settle in your new country!" without a SSN, it is that fundamental a requirement to every day life in the United States.
Anyway, the website listed a number to call if you had entered the country more then three weeks ago and were still waiting for your SSN. Which would definitely be me.
So I called that number, and as could only be expected I got an automated service asking me to press, or say, 1 for English, 2 for Spanish or 9 if I was afraid of keypads and needed counselling about that.
I worked my way through to the point where the automated lady said "Ok, I'll put you through to someone who can help. First I need your social security number, please enter it on your keypad or say it slowly."
I tried not pressing any buttons on the keypad, whilst not saying anything, and I also tried not pressing any buttons on the keypad but saying clearly "I don't have a number, that's why I'm calling", in both case I got the automated response.
"I'm sorry I didn't understand you. Please enter your Social Security Number now..."
I tried everything, twice, and there honestly wasn't any way around this, the automated lady is really insistent that you give her you SSN. So I e-mailed a nice polite complaint about being directed to a system that won't accept I don't have a Social Security number, when I'm calling precisely because I want to find out why I don't have that number in the first place.
Then I looked up the phone number for our local Social Security office, and worked my way through the automated system there. I actually managed to speak to a real person, who was super nice but totally unhelpful. She couldn't seem to get her head around my last name being hyphenated, "Could we have put [that] as your middle name?", Oh, I really hope not. So although she couldn't find my name in the system (which was apparently all she could do for me anyway) I wasn't exactly a hundred percent convinced she'd actually searched for anything like my name. I also asked about the fifteen week delay and she said that they "...hadn't heard any different.", which has to be one of the most back covering statements in recent history, and she didn't offer any other suggestions except that I call back in a few weeks.
By this point I'd spent a fairly frustrating hour on the phone, and had no new information to show for it. When the Doc came home, I explained the situation to him as best I could without resorting to language ill-befitting a lady.
Being a problem-solving man, Doc C decided that he would call the automated harridan on the main SSN helpline. He got deeply frustrated with her very quickly, and he also couldn't find a way round giving them a Social Security number and eventually gave them his own just to talk to someone with a pulse. He then waited for ten minutes listening to what he felt was the worst on-hold music ever. When he did speak to a real live person all that that person could do was to check if I was already in the system as having been assigned a number. Which I haven't been.
Then the Doc tried a different tack, could we go to the local Social Security office with all the bits of paper we need and ask them to look it up? Yes, we could do that. And if I didn't already have a SSN, could they process my request then? Yes, but we'd probably have to queue and they wouldn't give me the number then and there. They'd have to post the number to me, and that takes a few days.
But essentially, we can go to the office and get it all sorted out? All we have to do is QUEUE? That's all we have to do? I'm British for crying out loud, I was born queueing! It's one of those things we Brits are famously good at! Why did no-one tell us this before?
On Monday we intend to drive to the office, which is a mere 45 minutes away. Updates as they happen.
* * * * * Postscript * * * * *
For some reason Google tends to direct people to this post fairly frequently. So, for any new visitors who are wondering what happened, the story of my appointment at the Social Security Office can be found here, and the continuing saga of my applications for both my Visa and Social Security Number can be found here, and in a slightly different format here.
I don't know if any of this will be actually useful to anyone, but I hope it's at least moral support as you struggle with the system. You'll get there in the end.
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