pancakemeow

I sent an email enquiry today. been almost 2 months since changing to "in process" on ecas....... feeling pretty impatient!

scottish_maple

Awww thanks...that made me chuckle...lol

scottish_maple

Notice – Strike Action
June 11, 2013 — The Professional Association of Foreign Service Officers (PAFSO) union is currently taking strike action. PAFSO union members responsible for processing visa applications have been walking out of offices in Canada and overseas.

Posted processing times for both temporary and permanent resident visa applications do not take into account work stoppages.

Anyone applying for a visa should anticipate delays and submit their application as far in advance as possible.

Contingency plans are already in place to ensure all offices remain open and are providing at least a minimum level of service. Priority will be placed on urgent humanitarian applications.

CIC continues to closely monitor the situation.

leighbleigh

Just got this on twitter:
Tim Edwards (@PafsoApase) tweeted at 8:57 PM on Tue, Jun 11, 2013:
@leighbleigh #dipstrike features rolling but indefwalkouts targeting #goc priority files & visits. Not a general strike of all members.
(https://twitter.com/PafsoApase/statu...43842046996480)

IzzyR

Thanks newstart! Nice to have a congrats amidst all the guilty feelings Are you on the spreadsheet? I am not taking my 'approval' for granted - feel extremely lucky, as clearly there is a huge element of 'potluck' involved in this process.

Am keeping for everyone during this blasted strike, and beyond!

newstart187

Don't feel bad. I am 'herewecome' on the s/s so received in Miss 27th Dec, approved 17th Jan iirc. I am just grateful things are still moving despite the strike.

scottish_maple

Congratlations! Your case is not unusual Alot of people on previous spreadsheet have had quick timelines and I am sure there will be a few more 2013 Applicants who get DM before some 2012. It is just the way it is. So enjoy your moment.

I am also jealous but also very pleased for you as I know how much this means for couples and families. ENJOY!!

IzzyR

Thanks a mill Scottish maple!

ryno3

Hi Guys, im a newcomer to this and have trawled through the pages looking to see if this has been mentioned already. Myself and my Fiance have lived together for a year as of July 1st. Im British shes canadian, im currently on a work visa. So we will be sending our application as of July 1st common law sponsorship outland. We are engaged to be married in September of this year. Should we mention in the application that we are engaged to be married or not? only because from what ive read if they see your first applying as common law but getting married shortly they will shelve your application until your married? Also if we dont mention it should we then let them know after were married that the wedding happened as it asks to update them if anything changed like, birth, death, marriage etc? As i dont want it to seem like the marriage was a quick decision when in fact its been planned for a long time. I just want to do this properly but there doesn't seem to be much info on this situation. Any help would be huuuuuuuuugely appreciated

SchnookoLoly

My now-husband and I were in exactly this position - I'm Canadian living in the UK. We applied January 2012 and got married in April 2012. We applied as common-law.

For us, it wasn't an issue at all. We included details about the upcoming marriage in the application - details of how he proposed, and plans for the wedding so far (we sent copies of things like the contract with the hotel and the booking for the registrar).

When they were processing the second stage of the application, which for us was about June-ish, CIC did call my husband to ask if we had gotten married. Now, I did email CIC as per the instructions in the guide a few days after the wedding to say that we had gotten married and that I was taking his surname. I didn't get a response, and clearly they didn't match it up with the file - my husband did tell them when they called that we got married and they seemed satisfied. We had PPR about a week later.

The biggest advice I can give to you though - DO NOT LIE ON THE APPLICATION!! AT ALL!!! ABOUT ANYTHING!!! NO MATTER HOW MINOR!!!! Be 100% truthful. Don't leave anything out, don't massage details, nothing like that - that is just asking for trouble. Where did you leave that you should leave out that you're engaged?! That just seems like completely daft advice.

From what we read, it's completely fine for you to apply as common-law as soon as you apply - from what I gathered, the fact that you're planning your wedding just adds to the strength of your case. If they question why you aren't waiting until you're married (which I highly, highly doubt they will), just be honest! In our case, we wanted to get things moving with sponsorship, which we knew would take us the whole of 2012 (since our landing wouldn't happen until December, regardless of when they approved us), and the plan is to move in 2013, so we applied pre-wedding just to kick off the process generally. There's one part in the application where it asks for your plans to relocate in Canada - we used that opportunity to explain that we wanted to move in 2013, and would start applying for jobs once PR had been granted so that we didn't have to deal with the obstacle of visas/permits/etc.

HTH, good luck!

IzzyR

I second what SchookoLoly says above - I am in the exact situation you are in, and like you will be doing, we applied as soon as we qualified for common-law. We included details of our intention to get married in August this year. I included copies of our happy engagement cards from friends/family, pictures from when my partner proposed, and the quotes from wedding suppliers. Granted, I don't know what the "Decision Made" is yet, but assuming it is PR, it hasn't harmed us at all to specify our intention to marry, and our application certainly was not shelved because of it!
Best of luck!!

markstimson

Also just to add for your piece of mind, there is a form you complete in the application process which asks questions about your relationship. It specifically asks if you are engaged, where you are getting married, was there an engagement party etc. So through the questions, you can see it is perfectly acceptable for you to be applying in your situation and there are questions built around it. You then send all the proof in support of your application along with it.

ryno3

SchookoLoly thank you soooooooomuch for this. You have no idea how much your personal experience will help us with this It was just through researching everything in preparation for the application that we came across a few people mentioning it on another site about it holding up their application. But like you say i would never lie or with hold information with this stuff, learnt alot about that from doing many work visa's here The problem is just as i will be re-newing my work visa July 1st the same day we become common law as we have lived together for a year so processing times are currently at 11months so doesn't give us much space if things get held up as my visa will expire july 2014 that's all we are worried about really is if it gets delayed then i would have to change status and couldn't work which would be horrible. Honestly though you have put my mind at rest and we are actually starting the application this evening in preparation so thanks so much

ryno3

IzzyR thanks so much for your advise, that sounds like an awesome plan. hugely appreciate your help i will make sure we include all of that with our application Good luck with your application

ryno3

markstimson thanks so much, thats come in perfect time as were gona start the application this evening, thanks for giving me a huge amount of peace of mind, been stressing about this whole process for a while and all of you guys have just helped a huge amount. Thanks for all of your help