About a month ago, I started my J-1 Visa application.
Here were a list of issues I encountered …

Background Check

Google partnered with HireRight for background check. The process basically verifies your student status and checks for criminal records. To say I was disappointed with their service would be a huge understatement.

• Name and Phone Number was registered incorrectly
  • I filled in my Chinese name for them to lookup my records, but their system automatically (or perhaps someone manually) translated my name into English. That translation was incorrect, so they had my name wrong while they were making enquiries to the school in the beginning.
  • For a caller calling from a foreign nation, the total number of digits for Taiwanese (mobile) phone numbers is 9, but HireRight’s system requires me to fill in 10. Since I couldn’t fill in the correct number, I never received any (SMS) notifications regarding profile updates on my phone.
• No direct communication can be established
  • I had no way to communicate with their “investigator” to sort out these issues.
  • I opened 2 offline support tickets, but their support didn’t forward my message. It wasn’t until I opened a 3rd ticket that I finally had my message delivered through.
• Unprofessional “investigator”
  • From the logs left in the profile, they called my school during off hours (past 5pm) and couldn’t make contact with the school in their initial 3 attempts.
  • I had to coordinate between school officials and their “investigator” through indirect contact.

J-1 Application (Developing)

I mostly encountered issues with my school (National Chiao Tung University), as very rarely do students need J-1 visas.

• Academic Institution Certification
  • This document is called “立案證明” in the school and can be applied through the office of your department.
• Letter of Enrollment
  • You need to visit 註冊組 in person and ask them to make a custom Letter of Enrollment.
  • It needs to include the term “full-time student”.
• List of Current Courses
  • There is an official document which can be applied at 課務組.
  • Make sure the listed academic year is correct (Mine wrote 2016-2016 instead of 2016-2017 initially).