A couple of pretty basic Qs about my PR status obligations ??

[waxweasel]

Just wanting to know in black and white where I stand and when I need to return to Canada, how long I have to stay, etc.

I landed as a PR in November 2015 (flew to Canada just to 'land'), stayed 3 weeks and then returned to my home country. From my understanding, I had 5 years from that date in which to spend 2 years in Canada, so I thought I would stay in my home country and continue with life, until maybe 2.5 years in/2.5 years left...before returning to Canada to accrue my 2 year requirement : so ideally returning mid-2018 to stay for 2 years straight.

Now I am just wondering: Is that 2 years straight? Can there be any breaks? Can I leave Canada to go into the US for a week or 2 here or there? (If I have 2.5 years remaining before the expiry date of my PR, does that mean that I have 6 months worth of time within that 2.5 years to technically spend outside Canada? Is the 2 year requirement consecutive? Or Cumulative?)
If cumulative, does that mean everyone has to spend 2 years straight in Canada without leaving for a single day, in order to maintain their PR?? Surely not? Is it just a cumulative 730 days within the entire 5 years?

Also, what is the easiest way to prove physical presence for 2 years? (Assuming it can take a while to find a job and thus produce payslips,etc) Is there another simpler way? Bank statments showing everyday transactions at businesses in Canada? Rent receipts?
Looking for a method that I can carry out easily myself, without having to rely on having a job, an employer being organised, etc.

I mean, technically, could i not withdraw $20 at an ATM every day for 2 years and show bank statements showing those? Or would they think that maybe someone is just using my card?

Also, My PR card was mailed to a friend after I left Canada 3 weeks after my landing, so I won't have it in hand until I return (which would be 2.5 years later). Will that be a problem in any way?

Cheers for any info/advice.

WW

 

[thecoolguysam]

The date of expiry of the PR card has nothing to do with your residency obligations.

The date you had become PR, you need to spend 2 years out of 5 years from that day.

It should not be straight 2 years but can be split. You can ask your friend to mail the PR card to your country. However, remember that it depends upon the receiving country's customs if they seize PR card or not.


So the burden to show that the person was physically present is up to applicant. The documents could include employment proof, rental/ownership of property, credit card bills, phone bills etc etc.

If you want to avoid unnecessary delays for pr renewal, try to spend approx more than 2 years like 730 days + 30 or 60 days buffer.

 

[keesio]

Also, what is the easiest way to prove physical presence for 2 years? (Assuming it can take a while to find a job and thus produce payslips,etc) Is there another simpler way? Bank statments showing everyday transactions at businesses in Canada? Rent receipts?
Looking for a method that I can carry out easily myself, without having to rely on having a job, an employer being organised, etc.

full-time employment is, without question, the best. But if may be difficult for whatever reason, then other things that are good are filing your taxes, proof of address like a signed lease if you rent, activities that require physical presence (records of doctor/dentist visits, continuing education, volunteer, etc).

bank statements and ATM receipts will not help much

 

[waxweasel]

SO I am about to find myself in a bit of a situation, where, after receiving my PR and landing and stamping in, I have returned to my home country right away for 3 years (knowing that I only need to live in Canada for 2/5years to maintain my PR).

Basically, my concern is that when I return to Canada I will have exactly 2 years or 2 years and 1 month remaining out of the 5 years in which I am required to be present in Canada for at least two of those years. Assuming it might take me a while to find a job or a rental property, what other means can I use to show proof of physical presence for 730 days?

Would taking a photo of myself every day in front of a landmark with time and date stamp suffice? Or retail/banking receipts?
Or what about photographs in front of somewhere that has an L.E.D of the date and time?
Is there not something simple and basic and DEFINITIVE that I can do to show concrete proof of my presence - without having to rely on payslips or rent receipts? Since I'm obviously not going to have a job or a place to live from day one, maybe not even for a couple of months after arriving?
Bank activity on my bank card at the same coffee shop every day? would that be "proof" ?

Any other practical ideas?

cheers,

 

[Bs65]

My 2 cents worth apart from fact very easy to over think things, when you eventually come to renew you PR card CBSA will have all the info required to show whether you leave the country or not in the 2 remaining years

https://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/agency-agence/reports-rapports/pia-efvp/atip-aiprp/thr-rav-eng.html

Of course if you want to take 730 dated photos in front of landmarks upto you but of course they can be photoshopped and from a practical viewpoint doubt IRCC would be that pleased having to look at 730 photos.

 

[dpenabill]

SO I am about to find myself in a bit of a situation, where, after receiving my PR and landing and stamping in, I have returned to my home country right away for 3 years (knowing that I only need to live in Canada for 2/5years to maintain my PR).

Basically, my concern is that when I return to Canada I will have exactly 2 years or 2 years and 1 month remaining out of the 5 years in which I am required to be present in Canada for at least two of those years. Assuming it might take me a while to find a job or a rental property, what other means can I use to show proof of physical presence for 730 days?

Would taking a photo of myself every day in front of a landmark with time and date stamp suffice? Or retail/banking receipts?
Or what about photographs in front of somewhere that has an L.E.D of the date and time?
Is there not something simple and basic and DEFINITIVE that I can do to show concrete proof of my presence - without having to rely on payslips or rent receipts? Since I'm obviously not going to have a job or a place to live from day one, maybe not even for a couple of months after arriving?
Bank activity on my bank card at the same coffee shop every day? would that be "proof" ?

Any other practical ideas?

cheers,

Key Note: As long as you do not in fact breach the PR Residency Obligation and you are settled and living in Canada within three years of the date you landed and became a PR, and you keep regular records of your life in Canada, THERE SHOULD BE NO PROBLEM. Sure, cutting-it-close has risks. The biggest risk, however, is that in cutting-it-close you end up in breach of the PR RO, which would create a real risk of losing PR status.

If you are cutting-it-close, after spending at least two straight years in Canada it may then take up to a year, or so, to apply for and obtain a new PR card. No amount of proof is likely to change the odds of that. But as long as you are in fact settled and permanently living in Canada, and have been present in Canada for two PLUS years, and have kept reasonable records of the life you have been living in Canada, the risk of a negative outcome is very low.

When you eventually apply for a new PR card, the only way to significantly reduce the risk of elevated scrutiny and non-routine processing (causing a longer than routine timeline to actually obtain a new PR Card), will be to have fully settled and be living permanently in Canada much sooner . . . perhaps within the first two years of landing would do.



OTHERWISE:

The plan is seriously flawed. It is RISKY.

If you are committed to this plan, it is what it is. You take your chances.

And in that event, sure, best to make sure, foremost, to arrive in Canada before being absent 1095 days since the date of landing, plus at least some margin, and secondly to capture and maintain a paper and digital trail of living and being physically present in Canada. Recognizing, without a doubt, that cutting-it-so-close is inherently risky.

Note: Others and I have addressed the risks of cutting-it-close in depth many times in this forum. An absence for more than 900 days (let alone approaching 1095 days) since landing is cutting-it-close and is risky enough. A "plan" to come to Canada cutting-it-that-close is especially risky, recognizing that scores of PRs with such "plans" have run into contingencies resulting in either a longer absence than that planned, or a contingency compelling travel outside Canada within the two years after they come to Canada, resulting in a BREACH of the PR Residency Obligation. For many such plans have not ended at all well.


A Paper and Digital Trail:

As for how to create a paper and digital trail of living and being physically present in Canada, I'd skip the theatrics and artificially created crap.

Dated photos in front of landmarks? Really? Each bearing a caption "Artificially Created Proof of Presence to ____ IRCC," numbered perhaps? Fill in the blank with "convince" or "scam" . . . since the only thing this is likely to convince IRCC of is this is proof of a scheme to manipulate Canada's immigration system (no matter how much it is NOT that).

Otherwise, sure, make an effort to capture, gather, and maintain concrete, objective documentation about where you are living (documents and receipts to show occupancy in the place where you are living) and your activities (documented job search activities, including visiting employment agencies, interview dates, and then proof of employment), and so on . . . AND all should go OK so long as you do not actually breach the PR RO.

Here is the thing: documentation of a life being lived in Canada, a paper and digital trail of a life in Canada, is NOT something which can be manufactured without a serious risk of being more suspicious than persuasive.

Ordinary, typical records work best. The absence of, or a shortfall in such records, raises a red flag.

In particular, if the typical documentation of living and being present is NOT enough to make the case, if that evidence falls short of proving presence, that in itself tends to support a negative inference. That tends to prove the individual was not settled and living in Canada, and that can make it quite difficult to prove otherwise.

To then present obviously manipulated or manufactured evidence (such as your dated- landmark-selfies scheme) could give the impression the individual is deliberately engaged in a scheme to deceive. It could become a Catch-22. (The essence of a Catch-22 is that what it takes to prove something tends to disprove that thing; comes from the Joseph Heller novel about WWII in which air force personnel who were mentally unfit to fly would have to assert they were mentally unfit to fly which itself would prove they were mentally fit to fly.) IRCC processing agents are, after all, people, people with brains. They tend to put two-plus-two together.

MOSTLY, however, if you actually come to settle and live permanently in Canada, less than three years after the date you landed, and you keep ordinary records, and remain settled and living in Canada after that, the odds of a serious problem (more serious than some delays in processing a new PR card application for example) will be VERY LOW.

Edit to add: The latter is premised on ACTUALLY arriving and settling in Canada in less than three years after landing. A "PLAN" to do so but cutting-it-close, in contrast, is RISKY. Again, many have had such plans and life, which has a way of throwing all sorts of curves at us along the way, interfered, and the plan failed.

 

[Wolverine17]

SO I am about to find myself in a bit of a situation, where, after receiving my PR and landing and stamping in, I have returned to my home country right away for 3 years (knowing that I only need to live in Canada for 2/5years to maintain my PR).

Basically, my concern is that when I return to Canada I will have exactly 2 years or 2 years and 1 month remaining out of the 5 years in which I am required to be present in Canada for at least two of those years. Assuming it might take me a while to find a job or a rental property, what other means can I use to show proof of physical presence for 730 days?

Would taking a photo of myself every day in front of a landmark with time and date stamp suffice? Or retail/banking receipts?
Or what about photographs in front of somewhere that has an L.E.D of the date and time?
Is there not something simple and basic and DEFINITIVE that I can do to show concrete proof of my presence - without having to rely on payslips or rent receipts? Since I'm obviously not going to have a job or a place to live from day one, maybe not even for a couple of months after arriving?
Bank activity on my bank card at the same coffee shop every day? would that be "proof" ?

Any other practical ideas?

cheers,

Simplest way is entry and exit stamps on your passport

 

[waxweasel]

My 2 cents worth apart from fact very easy to over think things, when you eventually come to renew you PR card CBSA will have all the info required to show whether you leave the country or not in the 2 remaining years

https://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/agency-agence/reports-rapports/pia-efvp/atip-aiprp/thr-rav-eng.html

Of course if you want to take 730 dated photos in front of landmarks upto you but of course they can be photoshopped and from a practical viewpoint doubt IRCC would be that pleased having to look at 730 photos.

Hey, thanks so much for your reply. So what you are effectively saying is that I don't need to do anything to show "proof" of presence overtly, as CIC can just access a report from CBSA to show all my entries and exits into Canada in the 5 year period from my "landing" date? And then deduce from that how many days I have actually been present? So there could be nothing to show in the way of "proof" that would override that data anyway, you'd imagine.

Another thing: I was also in Canada for 17 days when I originally came to stamp in for my PR "Landing", although I wasn't doing anything in that time, other than hanging out with friends - I couldn't "prove" it per se. So would that then mean that there is in fact a record that I have already accrued 17 of my required 730 days? So that would mean that I'd only need to accrue the remaining 713 days before my PR reaches the 5 year mark, if CBSA has all the data, right?

Also, there is a Canadian entry stamp in my Australian passport on the day I "landed" for my PR, but no exit stamp departing Canada 17 days later, and no stamp re-entering Australia (as they don't stamp our own passports on entry). Does that mean that CBSA still has data of my exit from Canada after those initial 17 days I spent there?

Cheers,

WW.