Adoption

Letter notifying parents Adopted Children’s Immigration Visa Unit is aware of their approval

Congratulations! The U.S. Citizen and Immigration Services recently notified U.S. Consulate Guangzhou that the Department of Homeland Security has approved your petition to adopt an overseas orphan. You must now wait for the China Center of Adoption Affairs to first send your agency (1) a referral of a specific child and then (2) a travel permission letter titled "Notice of Coming to China for Adoption." (Families living in China will follow special procedures. Contact CCAA’s agency Bridge of Love by sending an e-mail to zhsy@mail.china-blas.org.)

After you receive CCAA’s travel permission letter, agencies will arrange an appointment at U.S. Consulate Guangzhou. We strongly recommend you wait to finalize travel plans until your agency has received written confirmation of your appointment from U.S. Consulate Guangzhou. If your agency fails to secure an appointment in advance of your travel to China, you may be delayed in China for several additional days or longer during busy periods. (Attached to this letter is a description of what you can expect on the day of the interview.) 

Before coming to China, please make sure your agency has contacted the bureau of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services that approved your Application for Advanced Processing of Orphan Petition (Form I-600A) to confirm that your I-171H form and your fingerprint checks have not expired.

We look forward to seeing you here soon for your child's immigrant visa interview. We will do everything possible to make your visit to the Consulate as brief and painless as possible. In order to achieve our goal of smooth and efficient service, we count on parents and agencies/facilitators to fill out the enclosed paperwork in advance of your child's immigrant visa interview.

ADDITIONAL SPECIFIC INFORMATION

While waiting for your referral and travel permission letter, you or your agency are welcome to correspond with our office but the adoptions unit cannot process your case until you have received those documents. In addition, we do our best to answer all inquiries promptly. However, we recommend relying on your agency, not the Consulate, as your primary source of information. While the Consulate places a high priority on adoption cases and has created a separate adoptions unit to process orphan visa cases, the volume of generous parents hoping to adopt Chinese orphans has grown tremendously during the past several years, creating a significantly increased workload.  

You may contact U.S. Consulate Guangzhou’s adoptions unit by calling 011-(86) (20) 8518-7653, faxing 011 (86) (20) 3884-4420, or e-mailing GuangzhouA@State.gov. Routine questions are often best asked by e-mail because of the time zone difference and since we have many detailed, prepared replies for the majority of questions. Whenever you contact U.S. Consulate Guangzhou, please include your case number, beginning with the letters GUZ, listed at the end of this letter.

ADDITIONAL GENERAL INFORMATION

For general information about your child's immigrant visa appointment and adoption in China, please visit U.S. Consulate Guangzhou’s Adopted Children Immigrant Visa Unit’s Web site at http://guangzhou.usconsulate.gov/adoption.html. This Web site is also updated periodically with important notices.

In addition, a good source for information about developments regarding international adoptions in China and other countries is the Department of State's Office of Children's Issues (call 202-736-9130 or visit http://www.travel.state.gov/ and click on “Children&Family”).

SPECIAL CIRCUMSTANCES: IF ONLY ONE PARENT WILL TRAVEL TO CHINA

The following applies if only one parent will travel to China to complete the adoption:

g.) The parent traveling to China should be the petitioner on the I-600 petition;
h.) The parent traveling to China should be an American citizen;
i.) The Chinese Government requires that the parent who is not traveling to China provide a power of attorney permitting the parent who does travel to China to complete the adoption;
j.) Both parents must sign the I-600 form. The parent who does not travel to China may sign and date the form after receiving and accepting a referral of a child;   
k.) The State Department requires an affidavit or support form and supporting financial evidence and documents during your interview at U.S. Consulate Guangzhou. You can download affidavit of support forms at: http://www.uscis.gov/graphics/formsfee/forms/ (Please note that sometimes parents prepare these forms early in the process. The Consulate needs tax returns and supporting financial evidence for the most recent tax year.) Both parents must have signed the appropriate forms in the appropriate locations. The parent who will be traveling to China should be the sponsor on the affidavit of support form and the parent not traveling to China will either be considered a household member or a co-sponsor;
l.) If one parent will not see the child before the adoption, and the parents plan to re-adopt the child in the United States, some states have pre-adoption requirements. In these cases, a necessary document often serves as evidence of the parents' compliance with those requirements and the parent who travels must bring that document to his or her interview. Without such evidence, law and regulation prohibit U.S. Consulate Guangzhou from issuing an immigrant visa to the adopted child. To make sure you have met all of your state’s requirements, work closely with your adoption agency and/or contact your local state government.