Another Common-Law Sponsor Question

[YD1984]

So...... I've been dating my fiancee for just under 4 years, and living together in my house for 3 and a 1/2 years. For the first year she was here in Canada as a visitor; she left back to Spain after the first 6 months was up.
For the last 2 years she's been working under a temporary work visa which finally didn't get approved to be renewal. We have been here in Canada for the majority of those 2 years except we went on a vacation to Mexico for a month in January of 2013, and another vacation to Argentina for a month in January of 2014. The reality is that we are VERY much in a common-law relationship, and have tons of photos, friends, etc that can confirm it.
Do you think that those vacations will hurt our chances of a successful sponsorship ?

It's not like she moved away or anything during those times, we were just on 2 great vacations and also have photos to show it.

 

[Alurra71]

No. Why would a vacation hinder you sponsoring her?

 

[YD1984]

I'm not sure really. I guess I'm just wanting to make sure everything in the application will be as good as it can be.

 

[Alurra71]

No those won't hurt your application.

 

[Carlaganda23]

So...... I've been dating my fiancee for just under 4 years, and living together in my house for 3 and a 1/2 years. For the first year she was here in Canada as a visitor; she left back to Spain after the first 6 months was up.
For the last 2 years she's been working under a temporary work visa which finally didn't get approved to be renewal. We have been here in Canada for the majority of those 2 years except we went on a vacation to Mexico for a month in January of 2013, and another vacation to Argentina for a month in January of 2014. The reality is that we are VERY much in a common-law relationship, and have tons of photos, friends, etc that can confirm it.
Do you think that those vacations will hurt our chances of a successful sponsorship ?

Hi,

Did you take the vacation together? It wouldn't hurt at all if its only for few weeks holiday. As long as you live together for 12 months continues and you can prove it. There shouldn't be a problem. I applied for Common-Law myself...

The 2 years continues years that you've been living together qualified for common-Law the other few years before it doesn't since she left the Country for too long.

When you file your application, you have to start when she arrived in Canada for her Temporary Work Permit till the present.
Let me know if u need any help!

 

[YD1984]

The other question I have is this-

We have been living together and both paying for the bills, rent, food, etc. But all the bills are currently in my name cause she would always just pay me her portion of it. I guess I'm just worried, but we have TONS of photos and friends/family who would attest to the fact that we are a real common-law couple.
If we go and add her name to the lease, power bill, and set up a joint bank account tomorrow will they look at when these were started ?

 

[Alurra71]

No, only that they are now in both names. You could also add each other as beneficiaries on life insurance policies you might have. The more proof the better.

 

[Rob_TO]

As long as you took vacation together, that counts towards common-law cohabitation, since you are still together.

If you took a 1 month vacation separately in the middle of 12 months qualifying, that could be a problem.

You definitely need real proof that you were cohabiting. Just letters from friends won't be enough, so definitely have both names on lease, joint bank account or credit card, shared life insurance, etc.

Also, what month did you guys officially reach 12 months continuous cohabitation? Whoever is the Canadian, by law should have changed their status with CRA from single to common-law in that month. In the year you became common-law, it's also law that you should have filed Canadian taxes as common-law and not single. This is used for proof also.

 

[Carlaganda23]

The other question I have is this-

We have been living together and both paying for the bills, rent, food, etc. But all the bills are currently in my name cause she would always just pay me her portion of it. I guess I'm just worried, but we have TONS of photos and friends/family who would attest to the fact that we are a real common-law couple.
If we go and add her name to the lease, power bill, and set up a joint bank account tomorrow will they look at when these were started ?

All the proofs that you will submit should be from the last 2 years that you've been living together. It doesn't count if you have just changed it recently like the joint bank account, lease agreement, proof of the same address, proof of shared finances ect.

It should start from the day she moved in with you till the present. Gather all the proofs of your cohabitation from the last 24 months.

 

[little_apple]

All the proofs that you will submit should be from the last 2 years that you've been living together. It doesn't count if you have just changed it recently like the joint bank account, lease agreement, proof of the same address, proof of shared finances ect.

It should start from the day she moved in with you till the present. Gather all the proofs of your cohabitation from the last 24 months.

This is correct. We didn't have all bills, bank account, lease etc right from the beginning in both names and VO Vienna asked for more proof that we've been common-law for the whole time. I hope they'll accept my explanation letter and the additional documents I sent them.

 

[Rob_TO]

All the proofs that you will submit should be from the last 2 years that you've been living together. It doesn't count if you have just changed it recently like the joint bank account, lease agreement, proof of the same address, proof of shared finances ect.

It should start from the day she moved in with you till the present. Gather all the proofs of your cohabitation from the last 24 months.

Remember that when a gf/bf move in together, they are still just "dating", and have no official status yet. So some things like joining bank accounts, credit cards, life insurance etc, may not be done the day they move in together. Many people wait until they actually achieve common-law status, so will only get these things after 12 months. Similarly a couple that is engaged may not get joint finances, until they are officially married.

Proofs that should date back to beginning of 12 months cohabitation, are things like joint rental/lease agreement, testimony from landlord, letters addressed to both people going to same address, shared receipts for groceries/home items etc. Many joint bank accounts, life insurance etc docs may not even show the date they were established, but just having them is still important to prove common-law even if they were opened close to submitting the application.

 

[YD1984]

Ok so today we'll open a joint bank account, and add her name to the lease. She likely has some bank statements from CIBC that are addressed to our place. I think her T4's from the last two years will show where she lived, but I likely didn't claim her as a dependent on mine. So I don't know how that will look ?
Looking back I see there is a lot of stuff we should have done differently in the last 2 years, cause I'm starting to think we don't have a whole lot of evidence to show that she has been my common law partner.

What are a few more things we can show to prove we were common law ?

 

[Rob_TO]

Ok so today we'll open a joint bank account, and add her name to the lease. She likely has some bank statements from CIBC that are addressed to our place. I think her T4's from the last two years will show where she lived, but I likely didn't claim her as a dependent on mine. So I don't know how that will look ?
Looking back I see there is a lot of stuff we should have done differently in the last 2 years, cause I'm starting to think we don't have a whole lot of evidence to show that she has been my common law partner.

As i mentioned above, if either of you filed taxes as single when in fact you were officially common-law, that is tax fraud. You should really go back and do adjustments to previous tax years, or else CRA can audit you and force you to do this later on, which will be a lot more difficult. On what date did you officially become common-law?

 

[YD1984]

Well I guess we would have been considered common law a year after we came back into Canada from our trip to Spain, which would be January of 2012.
When we did our taxes we just weren't sure how to do it because she was living here on a temporary work visa, and it had to be extended every 6 months or so.
I guess we never "Officially" became common law. It just happened naturally with how our relationship progressed.

 

[Carlaganda23]

Ok so today we'll open a joint bank account, and add her name to the lease. She likely has some bank statements from CIBC that are addressed to our place. I think her T4's from the last two years will show where she lived, but I likely didn't claim her as a dependent on mine. So I don't know how that will look ?
Looking back I see there is a lot of stuff we should have done differently in the last 2 years, cause I'm starting to think we don't have a whole lot of evidence to show that she has been my common law partner.

What are a few more things we can show to prove we were common law ?

Hi,

Statutory declaration from atleast two people attesting that your partner moved in with you from this month up to present.
That the relationship is genuine and continuing. I was in your situation few months ago, so I can understand the feeling.
We don't have joint back account but I sent him my share through interac in CIBC and that can give you proofs that since they will email you the receipt of the money you sent. That is the proof of shared finances.
I included the proof of the same address from the time I moved in with him till the present.

The joint lease agreement, I sent a form that I signed when I moved in in his apartment (just an acknowledgement letter that I moved in since my partner was there already from Sept 2011. I moved in with him last July 2012 so, I wasn't included in the lease but I did sign a form that I moved in with him and signed it. But we moved to another house and we officially signed a lease agreement last May 2013.

My partner made a last will and I am one of the beneficiaries. We also made a cohabitation agreement signed and notarised by a commissioner of oath. I included the Statutory Declaration of Common-Law Union as well.

He included me as co-occupant in the house insurance. We don't have joint bills in the utility since they only put one name in our internet, electricity and gas bill in Nova Scotia. I put him as a co-authorised person in my phone bill.

You can include the emails, facebook posts and letters that sent to your address.

Also I included letters from both of our families about our relationship( genuine and continuing)
We made a chronological story from the time we met, when the de-facto relationship started and till the present and future plans.
I also had a chronological order of our trips together, family gatherings and our dinner dates, met-ups with friends.

I made it really straight forward and strong application since I had my TFW refused, so they might scrutinize my application.

I hope this will help you in your application too