As updated on the CCAA website tonight:
“The CCAA has finished the review of the adoption application documents registered with our office before October 31, 2005.
The CCAA has finished the placement of children for the families whose adoption application documents were registered with our office before July 22, 2005.
Good news and bad news (for us, mostly bad news): Families on the internet are reporting that today they were notified by their adoption agencies that referrals have arrived for them. It looks like this referral batch includes dossiers with log in dates from July 14 – July 22. Our log in date was July 25. So we missed the cut off by 3 days.
Since batches usually are sent monthly, we shouldn’t expect a referral until an end of September batch is sent out.
The odd thing is that normally a lot of rumors start floating around the internet about a week before the Chinese mail out a batch of referrals. When a batch is sent out, adoption agencies are notified in the United States that referrals are on their way. When the adoption agencies are notified, this information makes its way onto the Internet bulletin boards. This time around, everyone was caught off guard. No one here in the U.S. knew that referrals were on their way. The first thing anyone heard about it was when someone posted on the Internet shortly before 12 PM today (Pacific Time) that they had received a call from their agency that their referral was in the office.
Usually, rumors start posting on the internet about a week before a batch of referrals is sent out by China. So far, no rumors so we are probably at least a week away from referrals.
I think the end of the wait will be here soon. I’m guessing we will get the referral (the notice from the Chinese government of our match with a child along with pictures, a short biography, and short medical report) during the last week of August (sometime between the 25th -31st).
Brief overview of the process: For the most part, dossiers (Chinese adoption applications) requesting healthy children are processed first come, first served in the order the dossiers are received in China. The only exception involves applications from ethnically Chinese applicants (they are given a preference by being given a short wait).
Thus, the log in date (LID) of the receipt of the dossier by China is very important in determining where one is in the wait process.
Referrals (notices of child matches) are sent by China in monthly batches rather than one at a time over the course of a month. The last monthly batch was sent out by China and received by couples around the world earlier this week.
Thus, the next batch should be sent out at the end of August. Because the last batch involved LIDs up to July 13, 2005 and our LID was July 25, 2005, we really think we’ll be getting a referral in the next batch.
Travel to China would then be 4-8 weeks after the receipt of the referral.
Just learned from our adoption agency that our dossier (Chinese adoption application) was logged in as received by China three days earlier than we were initially told. Our log in date (LID) was July 25, 2005 (not July 28, 2005). Having a LID even just three days earlier increases our chances that we will receive a referral (notification of a child match from China) at the end of August (when the next batch of referrals is expected to be sent out from China).
The China Center of Adoption Affairs (CCAA) website has been updated:
The CCAA has finished the review of the adoption application documents registered with our office before October 31, 2005.
The CCAA has finished the placement of children for the families whose adoption application documents were registered with our office before July 13, 2005.
People are posting on the internet bulletin boards that they have received their Chinese adoption referrals (notice of baby matches) today. It appears the people who are receiving their referrals today had their dossiers (Chinese adoption application packets) logged in as received by CCAA (the Chinese government agency that handles international adoptions) from June 29, 2005 – July 13, 2005.
Our dossier was logged in as received on July 28, 2005
It is very possible that when the next batch of monthly referrals is sent (at the end of August), we’ll be receiving a referral.
