Still Waiting....

Well, it's now March 2007 and we've made little headway. Our application STILL has not gone to the consulate.

We ran into another "problem" in February when the translator noticed that the medical form provided by our agency did not contain all of the information required by Kazakhstan. Fortunately, the translator notified us when she did not receive a response from our agency and we actually had resolved the problem by the day we were finally notified by our agency.

At this point, we have withdrawn our appilcation from the agency and are now working with the country coordinator who has picked up the ball. Essentially, we have fired our agency. I won't mention any names here, but recommend you contact us for referral information before using a Memphis agency.

We are very fortunate that our country coordinator has picked up the ball. Otherwise, we would have lost 1-2 months while switching agencies.

Words to the wise:
1) In addition to checking the BBB registry, ensure that your agency is fully staffed and that they keep the published office hours.
2) Whenever possible, use the forms posted on the Kazakh Embassy web site unless otherwise specified.