Verify the demand against official instructions. A private promise cannot change a payment receipt into an immigration decision.
Reconcile the charge with its actual purpose
Current processing is US$15,000 nonrefundable per person; the instructed principal gift follows successful vetting. Corporate terms separately include an annual 1% fee and a 5% transfer fee with a new background check. None should be described as a purchasable guarantee of approval.
Verify a demand before paying it, against the published instructions and through a channel reached independently rather than by a link or a number contained in the message itself. Compare four fields: who is to be paid, how much, by what method, and at what stage the payment is said to fall due. A mismatch in any one of them is a reason to stop.
Hypothetical example: a message offers to expedite a pending case for an additional charge payable to a private account; no published term creates such a service, and the request describes a payment nobody is authorised to demand. Keep every legitimate payment confirmation with its transaction reference, amount and date, and hold those apart from the professional fees and the travel or relocation costs a household also incurs, so the total picture stays readable. Nobody can sell an immigration outcome, and a payment already made does not become a decision because someone says it will.