Spousal Sponsorship

Marriage Certificate: Does it make a difference where I get married?

I want to sponsor my wife to Canada and she lives in Mexico. We are planning on getting married. Does it matter where we get married? Do we have to get married in Canada? Do we have to have a religious ceremony?

From immigration’s point of view, it does not matter where you get married. You can get married in Canada or outside of Canada. As long as you are married and your marriage is recognized in Canada, the physical location of your marriage is not subject to any restrictions. You must, however, ensure that you can provide immigration with your marriage certificate. If your marriage certificate is not in French or English, you will need to have it translated by a certified translator.

You can also have a civil or religious marriage. Each city, state, and that country has their own requirements with respect to the celebration of a marriage. You must contact the appropriate authorities and provide the required documentation to first (if applicable) obtain a marriage license, and then proceed with the marriage. We recommend you look into these requirements sooner than later to avoid any delays in celebrating your marriage.

In the province of Quebec, Notaries have jurisdiction to celebrate marriages. And this can be done in any location you wish (home, Notary’s office, garden, beach etc.). You will first need to meet with the Notary to discuss your preferences and a date will be scheduled to proceed with the marriage. You can visit this website to obtain further information about having your marriage handled by a Notary.

Can my spouse come and visit during the immigration process?

I want to sponsor my wife to Canada, and I want her to visit me during the process – is that possible?

I often get asked this question by couples. The answer is yes and no. Legally yes your wife can come and visit you during the process – but will she obtain the visitor visa, that is the real question.

If your wife is from a non-visa exempt country – meaning she first needs to obtain a Temporary Resident Visa (TRV) to travel to Canada, she might get the visa or she might not. Some TRVs from certain countries are unfortunately more difficult to be issued then others – this is often directly related to the economic and political situation of the country as well as its relation to Canada. Regardless of the country, there are facts that need to be demonstrated in a visitor visa to increase the chance of success. Canada’s immigration law requires that applicant’s applying for TRVs prove to the immigration officer that they will return to their country of citizenship upon the expiration of their visitor visa. To demonstrate this, we need to show that the applicant has ties to their home country meaning a reason to return such as employment, family obligations, property, studies, etc. Further, we must also demonstrate that while visiting Canada, applicants will be able to financially support themselves either through their personal savings or through the assistance of the person that is inviting them. It is important to demonstrate that the applicant will not engage in any unauthorized work and will respect immigration rules and regulations.

Some other facts to demonstrate will be that your wife has a good travel history if she has traveled. A good travel history means that she doesn’t have previous refusals, to Canada or any other country.

Finally, it is also a good practice to include in the application as much information about you, the husband inviting your wife to Canada. Information such as your employment, your financial information as well as ownership documentation. As lawyers preparing TRV application, we prepare detailed Statutory Declarations outlining this and attaching key documentation.

The immigration officer who receive complete and the well-prepared application will have a much easier time approving the application as they will not need to search for missing information or be confused by vague or unclear documents.

If you are inviting your girlfriend, your fiancé or your wife to visit you or if you have already submitted a sponsorship application and you now want to submit a TRV application for your wife, the TRCV application must be prepared properly. The reason for this is that an officer must be convinced that the trip to Canada is of temporary nature. A visitor visa will only be issued if the officer is confident that your partner will depart from Canada at the end of her stay. Obviously, if you are married, engaged or even just in a relationship, there is an automatic tendency of officer to believe that these applicants for a visitor visa will not leave Canada at the end of their trip, will overstay illegally, benefit from services they are not entitled too or even perhaps be in fake relationships simply to be able to travel to Canada to live permanently.

For this reason, it is important to outline in a TRV application all of these elements. I speak to a lot of clients who think that applying for a TRV is very straightforward and simple and all that is needed is an “invitation” letter. This might have been the case about a few decades ago, but not anymore. What often happens is that applicants get a refusal and then see me re-apply or contest the decision at the Federal Court. Yes, we can always re-apply or contest, and I have done a lot of these applications which resulted in a successful result. However, once there is a refusal on the record, it is more of a challenge to get approval. If we are not able to get approval, then your partner will need to wait outside Canada during the processing of the spousal sponsorship, which is not the end of the world, but most often than not, a pretty distressful situation for most of my couple clients.

In an ideal world all spouses, girlfriends, and fiancés should be allowed to obtain visitor visas to visit Canada during the processing of the spousal sponsorship – however, the reality is much different. Your spouse may or may not be issued a visitor visa and should this happen; then a robust and complete spousal sponsorship application will expedite the permanent residence application.

I am a Canadian citizen and I live with my husband, a citizen of India, in Dubai. We want to live in Canada in the near future.

As a Canadian citizen, you can sponsor your spouse or common-law partner to Canada even if you are non-resident in Canada.

Among other things, you will have to provide supporting documents to show your intention to move to and live in Canada permanently with your husband once the sponsorship has been finalized and approved.

In your application, you must demonstrate clearly that you are and have taken the steps to re-establish in Canada once your immigration application is approved.

I am in Canada as a visitor and I filed an overseas spousal sponsorship – can I stay in Canada with my spouse?

Many of our clients wish to stay in Canada while their spouses are sponsoring them. If you are a foreign national and you wish to stay in Canada while the spousal sponsorship application is in process overseas, you can do so as long as you always maintain valid visitor status. Usually, unless indicated otherwise by the immigration officer, you can stay in Canada as a visitor for up to 6 months. After this period of 6 months, if you wish to stay longer, you can either submit an extension application or exit and re-enter Canada. If you decide to exit and re-enter, you will need to convince the officer at the port-of-entry that you are entering Canada as a visitor and meet all the requirements. Our office provides a package which you can carry with you and present to the officer in the event of questioning.

Spousal Sponsorship approval – Why you shouldn’t despair over processing times

Having practiced Canadian immigration law for almost 10 years now, I have prepared and submitted hundreds of spousal sponsorship applications for my clients. I have had clients from all over the world and have dealt with Canadian Embassies and High Commissions of Canada from all parts of the world.

I decided to write this article for my current clients as well as for my new clients as I have realized that almost every single one of my spousal sponsorship cases triggers the same questions and fears at a certain point during the processing of the spousal sponsorship application.

When clients first consult with me with respect to sponsorship their spouses, a lot of key information is provided during the consultation about the procedures and processes of the spousal sponsorship application. I always advise my clients that it is crucial to prepare and submit a strong and complete application in order to first, avoid a refusal and second, avoid unnecessary back and forths with immigration due to incomplete or missing information and documentation and decrease the processing times. I also always advise clients that the processing times posted on the CIC website, although regular led updated by CIC, are merely approximations and the processing times can very well be longer or shorter. Further, I advise clients of what my experience has been with respect to a specific region given that I have submitted hundreds of applications and can provide strong facts with respect to how long an application will most likely take.

When I first start working with clients, the understand of the approximation of processing times generally sits well and it is understood. However, I have noticed a trend in my spousal clients whereas a few months after filing the application, calls and emails are sent to our office asking us “when will the sponsor be approved?”, “Why haven’t we heard anything from CPC-Mississauga?”, “But it says 61 days online?”, “When can my wife come to Canada?”