Aperture

Hello everyone!

Quick background information: I'm Canadian and moved to the UK for university in September 2007. I met my partner (who is British) and started dating him in February 2008. I got a post-study work visa after I graduated in December 2008. We moved in together (in the UK) and co-signed a lease in June 2010. We moved to Canada later that summer.

We're planning to apply for his PR via outland common-law sponsorship in June 2011. I've tried to educate myself a lot on this topic, but I'm nervous and have a lot of questions--I'd appreciate any guidance you can offer!

• We left the UK in mid-August 2010, visited Canada for a week to find an apartment, stayed with friends in the US for a month, then arrived back in Canada (and activated his BUNAC 12-month working holiday visa at that time) in late September 2010, which is also the month when we co-signed a new lease in Canada. In other words, we have one month during which we were definitely together in the same place, but not resident in the UK or Canada. Our friends in the US are willing to write a letter confirming that we were staying with them during this time. Will this be okay or is it going to arouse suspicion? Is there any way of ensuring that CIC believes us?
  
• I know it is faster to apply outland, which we are happy to do. This is the correct application, right? (I don't want to accidentally fill out the wrong one!) Is there any problem with us filling in the outland application when we're clearly living together in Canada (in other words, he's not actually "outland" at the moment)?
  
• Is there any benefit to just getting a quick courthouse marriage done now and applying as spouses instead of common-law partners? (We'd like to just be common-law for now and get married in a year or two, but we're willing to do a courthouse marriage now if it will save us a significant amount of hassle.)
  
• We plan to submit the application in June 2011 and would like to both take a holiday in the UK for a week in August 2011. Is this possible/problematic given that the application may still be processing during that time? (In other words, does an outland application prohibit international travel during application processing? I thought it was just inland, but want to be sure.)
  
• Anything else we need to know? Extra tips for reassuring CIC that we're a genuine couple, and therefore hopefully speeding the process along? His BUNAC visa expires in September--we're hoping he'll get PR before it expires (or at least not long after)!

Thank you in advance for your help!

alexisatk

This is will be fine. You can get the letter from your friend if it makes you feel better. My OH and I applied common-law where for one month we did not have a lease proving our relationship. Two weeks were spent living at his parents house in the UK and then two weeks were spent living with my parents in Canada.
We applied outland while living in Canada. Tons of people do it's not a problem. It just takes a little longer to get your passport back from London... although still A LOT quicker than applying in land.

Those are the correct forms.
Definietly not, if you have the proof for common-law it is very easy to get approved. My OH and I thought we had a really complicated Common-law application but it was approved no issues they only spent 1 day looking at the app. Obviously CIC London thought it was straight forward.
It won't be a problem, it only becomes a problem when they ask for your passport and you send it away and pray it comes back before your holiday. It took my OH's application 4 months to get the PPR from receipt in Missassauga.
This forum is a great help asks tons of questions here.

Aperture

Thank you for your response, alexisatk! I'm not sure when you mean by "it only becomes a problem when they ask for your passport and you send it away and pray it comes back before your holiday". Does that mean we'd likely have enough time to get back his passport (two months?) or not?

alexisatk

I mean, that once they ask for your passport you have 45 days to submit it to London (in person or by mail). Then they say it takes 6 weeks to get back to you. My OH is currently waiting to get his passport back and it's been almost 7 weeks now.

If your holiday is in August, and you submit in June it is unlikely you will have your PPR before you get back from Holiday. At the moment it is estimated to be 5 weeks for the sponsorship part of the application to be approved. It took my app 4 weeks to be approved then sat in London for 3 months before they had time to look at it.

So your holiday shouldn't be impacted, but of course you need to weigh the pros and cons and look at other people's timelines as well. Some people say they have had the whole thing completed in 2-3 months but that seems rare and as far as I can tell those timelines seem to have occured last summer/fall. Most current timelines seem to be running 4 months until they get the passport request give or take a few weeks.

alexisatk

The praying part comes in because we are due to go on Holiday on June 2nd to the UK... and are praying to get my OH's passport back in the next 3 weeks!! It's already been almost 7 weeks since London received the passport.

Aperture

You say the holiday shouldn't be impacted, but it sounds like he wouldn't have his passport back in time (which he certainly needs in order to be able to fly to/from the UK). Can you clarify? (Apologies--I know I need to do more reading on this!) If we submit the application in June and want to both go to the UK for holiday in August (approx. 8 weeks later), how is that possible?

I hope you get your partner's passport back soon so you can enjoy the holiday!

alexisatk

It's possible because you don't seen your passport until it is requested by London, typically 4 months after you submit the application to missassauga. In our case our passport was requested on March 15th. Our application was received in Missassauga on November 17, 2010.

After the passport is received in our case on March 21st, the typical processing time is supposed to be 6 weeks. So we should have our passport back by now.

Aperture

Ah, okay. So if I'm understanding correctly, the process goes something like this:

(1) Submit application for me (Canadian) to be a sponsor for my partner (British); neither of us sends in a passport at this point
(2) Get approval of sponsorship; CIC requests his passport, which we have 45 days to submit

Is that about right? In that case, I could see how we'd be able to start the process, go on holiday, then come back and send in his passport *after*.

caleo

Very doubtful they would ask for your passport before August if you are applying in june - the file will only be sent to london in July. Even if, by some miracle it was processed that quickly, you have (I think?) 40 days to send off your passport - so your timelines would be fine. Your passport is requested after London have processed their side, so you have plenty of time.

alexisatk

Yes that is correct. I'm obviously super tired this morning, my apologies for the lack of clarity.

Aperture

No problem at all! I really appreciate your help (especially considering how much more reading I should have done on my own before asking questions).

Aperture

Excellent! I mean, annoying that it can take so many months, of course, but nice that it doesn't get in the way of our travel plans!

Partner has been unemployed this whole time, anyway, so it's not like he's going to have to temporarily quit a job while this all goes through (assuming there will be a gap between when his working holiday visa expires and when the PR kicks in, which it sounds like there almost certainly will be).