Your firm stopped answering and an RFE deadline is running. How to confirm what is due, get your file back, and change attorneys without losing the date.
Reviewed by Ekaterina Fitenko, Esq. — Florida Bar #1064536. With 20+ years of experience in the legal field, she advises families and employers whose petitions change hands in the middle of a case, in English and Russian.
Before you deal with the lawyer, write down two facts: which form is pending with USCIS, and what date is printed on the most recent notice. The date is the only part of this situation that will not negotiate with you.
Every USCIS filing gets a receipt notice, Form I-797C, carrying a 13-character receipt number: three letters followed by ten digits. The letters say where the case sits — IOE for cases filed or transferred into the online system, EAC, WAC, LIN, SRC, YSC, MSC and NBC for the service centers and the National Benefits Center. Keep that number where you can read it aloud on a phone call; it is the key to every check below.
Then look at what the notice is. A receipt notice starts the clock on processing. A Request for Evidence (RFE) starts a clock on you. A Notice of Intent to Deny (NOID) starts a shorter one, usually 30 days. A denial opens a 30-day window for Form I-290B, Notice of Appeal or Motion, and 33 days when the decision was mailed. Each is a different problem with a different remedy, so name yours first.
You can confirm the status of a pending USCIS case yourself, in about ten minutes, without any cooperation from the firm that filed it. Case status is published online against the receipt number, and the USCIS Contact Center at 800-375-5283 will speak to the applicant or petitioner directly.
Create a myUSCIS account at my.uscis.gov and add the receipt number to it. If the firm filed online under its own account, the case may not attach to yours — a limitation of the account system, not a sign that anything is wrong with the case. Then the paper notices and the Contact Center are your record.
Fix one thing immediately, because it loses mail silently: if you moved and the firm never updated your address, USCIS is still writing to the old one. Non-citizens must report a change of address to USCIS within 10 days of moving, on Form AR-11 or through the online account. Do it before you spend a week wondering why nothing arrives.
A Request for Evidence carries a response deadline printed on the notice itself, commonly up to 87 days from the date of issue, and it is not extended for any reason — including a lawyer who stopped answering the phone. USCIS does not grant extensions of an RFE response period.
What happens if the date passes is stated plainly in the notice: USCIS decides the case on the record as it stands. In practice a case that was sent an RFE and received nothing back is decided without the missing evidence, which is usually a denial. There is no separate warning letter before that happens.
Read the deadline off the notice rather than counting it yourself. The 87 days people quote is an outer limit built from a 12-week response period plus mailing time; a particular RFE may give less. The printed date controls, and a response is timely when it arrives at the correct USCIS address by that date — for RFE responses receipt counts, not the postmark.
If the deadline has passed and a denial has issued, the clock that matters becomes the 30 days for Form I-290B — a different filing with its own fee, listed in the USCIS Fee Schedule in effect on the date you file. Confirm the exact date of the decision before assuming the window is closed.
The documents in your case file are yours, and a former firm is required to return the papers and property you are entitled to when the representation ends. Under the Rules Regulating The Florida Bar, rule 4-1.16(d) obliges a lawyer who stops representing a client to take reasonable steps to protect that client's interests, including surrendering papers and property to which the client is entitled.
Ask in writing, and name the items: every I-797 notice issued in the case, a complete copy of what was filed with USCIS including exhibits, the RFE with all its attachments, originals you handed over such as birth or marriage certificates. Send the request by email and by certified mail the same day, and state in it what the deadline is.
A fee dispute is a separate matter from your ability to meet a government deadline. Money you may or may not owe is resolved through the firm's fee arrangement and, if necessary, through fee arbitration at The Florida Bar — it is not a reason for you to sit without the evidence USCIS asked for. Ask for copies if the firm wants to keep its own set.
There is also a slow route that does not depend on the firm at all: a records request to USCIS under the Freedom of Information Act, on Form G-639 or through the USCIS FIRST online system. Treat it as a way to rebuild the history later. FOIA processing takes months and will produce nothing for an RFE due in three weeks.
Form G-28, Notice of Entry of Appearance as Attorney or Accredited Representative, is the document that tells USCIS who speaks for you. When a new attorney files a G-28 for the same matter, it replaces the prior representative in the USCIS record for that matter, and notices begin going to the new attorney instead.
Filing a new G-28 does not by itself move any deadline. It changes the address on the file and nothing about the calendar. An RFE due on a printed date is still due on that date, whether the response comes from the first firm, the second, or from you.
You do not need the old firm's signature or permission. The prior attorney may separately file a withdrawal, but your right to choose a different representative does not wait on that. The new G-28 is normally filed together with the substantive response, so USCIS matches representative to filing in one step.
If your case is not with USCIS but in immigration court, the form is different: representation before the Executive Office for Immigration Review is entered on Form EOIR-28, and deadlines there are set by the immigration judge rather than printed on a service center notice. Say which one you are in when you call, because the answer changes completely.
With two or three weeks left on an RFE, a new firm can read what USCIS actually asked for, tell you which items you already have, and file a response with a fresh G-28 before the printed date. That is the realistic scope of an emergency takeover, and it is often enough: most RFEs ask for a defined list, not a rewritten case.
What no firm can do is extend the deadline, persuade USCIS to overlook a date that has passed, or promise you an approval. Under the advertising rules of The Florida Bar we do not predict outcomes, and a firm that guarantees one on a first phone call is telling you something useful about itself.
The honest variable is evidence, not effort. If the RFE asks for a document that a foreign civil registry takes eight weeks to issue and you have eleven days, the plan changes: file what exists with proof of what was requested and when. That conversation is better had on day one than on day nine.
Two separate resources exist for this, and both are public. The Florida Bar accepts complaints about Florida lawyers online at floridabar.org, and its member search on the same site shows whether a particular attorney is currently eligible to practice law in Florida.
The member search is worth running first. It lists the lawyer's bar number, admission date, current eligibility status and any public discipline history. An attorney who is not currently eligible to practice cannot represent you before USCIS either, and that is confirmable in under a minute rather than inferred from unanswered emails.
For complaints, The Florida Bar operates the Attorney Consumer Assistance Program at 866-352-0707, which handles intake and resolves many communication problems short of formal discipline. A lawyer unreachable for weeks while a client's deadline runs is what that program exists for.
Run this track in parallel, never instead. A bar complaint does not respond to your RFE, does not toll a USCIS deadline, and does not produce your file next week. Deal with the government deadline first and the professional-conduct question second, in that order, on the same day if you can.
In the United States a notary public is not a lawyer. A notary is authorized to witness signatures, and nothing in that authority permits giving advice about immigration filings, choosing a form, or representing anyone before USCIS.
The confusion is not the client's fault. In many civil-law countries a notario público is a credentialed legal professional, so the same word carries a promise here that it does not deliver. Immigration consultants and document preparers sit in the same gap: they may type what you dictate, and they may not advise you on the law.
Only two categories of people may give immigration legal advice and appear on a G-28: attorneys licensed by a state bar and in good standing, and representatives accredited by the Department of Justice through the Executive Office for Immigration Review working at a recognized organization. USCIS publishes guidance on this at its avoid-scams pages, and the test is simple enough to apply on the phone.
Warning signs, in the order they usually appear: no written fee agreement, no G-28 filed and no copy given to you, payment in cash without a receipt, no copies of anything sent to USCIS. If a representative went silent and you cannot find a G-28 with their name on it, the odds are good that there never was one and that USCIS has had nobody but you on the file.
Have the receipt number and the deadline date in front of you when you dial. A first consultation spent reconstructing which form is pending is a consultation not spent on the response.
Photographs taken on a phone are acceptable for a first review. Do not delay the call to produce clean scans or to gather everything the RFE lists — the first conversation exists to decide what is achievable before the date, and that decision is made faster with an incomplete set than with none.
Yes. You may change representatives at any point in a pending case, and you do not need the prior attorney's consent. The new attorney files Form G-28 with USCIS, which replaces the prior representative in the record for that matter.
No. USCIS does not extend the response period for a Request for Evidence, and the reason for a late response does not change the date printed on the notice. If the date passes, the case is decided on the record as it stands.
Make the request in writing, state the government deadline in it, and ask for copies of the USCIS notices and filed evidence specifically. Under the Rules Regulating The Florida Bar a lawyer ending a representation must surrender papers and property to which the client is entitled, and a fee question is handled separately, including through fee arbitration at The Florida Bar.
The new Form G-28 supersedes the earlier one for that matter in the USCIS record, and USCIS begins sending notices to the new attorney. The prior attorney may also file a withdrawal, but your change of representative does not depend on it.
Possibly. A denial can be challenged by Form I-290B, Notice of Appeal or Motion, generally filed within 30 days of the decision, or 33 days when the decision was mailed. Refiling from the beginning is sometimes the better route, and which one fits depends on the benefit sought and on why the case was denied.
It addresses the lawyer's conduct, not the filing. A complaint to The Florida Bar does not pause a USCIS deadline and does not produce your file quickly, so handle the pending deadline first and file the complaint alongside it.
$200 for 30 minutes, in English or Russian. Call (305) 315-3425 or email fitenkolaw@gmail.com to schedule.
This article is informational only and is not legal advice. Form editions, fees and processing times change; confirm current requirements with USCIS before filing. Reading this page does not create an attorney-client relationship.
Fitenko Law PLLC, 11555 Heron Bay Blvd, Suite 277, Coral Springs, FL 33076 (main office); 600 Three Islands Boulevard, Hallandale Beach, FL 33009 (by appointment only). Phone: (305) 315-3425. Email: fitenkolaw@gmail.com