People going through the naturalization process will need to attend a biometrics appointment which must not be missed. Once the U.S. citizenship applications Form N-400, Application for Naturalization filed by the applicants are approved, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) will schedule them for biometrics appointments. They will be required to appear at Application Support Centers (ASC) where their pictures and fingerprints will be taken. Fingerprints collected at the ASC will be used to conduct criminal background checks.
Applicants must go to the ASC at the scheduled time and take with them their green cards and their appointment notices. Once the applicants go to the ASC where an appointment has been scheduled, they will need to hand the biometrics appointment notices to the officers at the ASC. Applicants will then be issued forms in which they need to enter some basic information including their names, citizenship, race, alien registration numbers, etc.
Followed by that, officers at the ASC will start the fingerprinting process. Digital photographs of the applicants will be taken and applicants will be required to sign their names on an electronic keypad. Biometrics information collected at the ASC will be sent to the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) for review. Once the FBI checks them against records held by the police, it will send a report to USCIS showing whether the applicants have violated the U.S. immigration laws or committed crimes.
After the applicants submit their biometrics information, their appointment notices will be stamped. This notice with the stamp will help them to prove that they have attended their appointment. Officers at the ASC will not have access to the applications and they will not be able to answer questions about any of the cases. Once USCIS gets the FBI reports, it will schedule the applicants for the naturalization test and interview, if they are eligible for citizenship.
Steps to Naturalization
Step 1 to Naturalization – File Form N-400
