common law - confirmation documents

[ashia]

Hi,

me and my partner are preparing to sponsoring common-law partner. he is canadian, i am polish.

We live together since january, with some breaks (i had to go to Europe, job related stuff, also i'm as a visitor in Canada, working now on my IEC application, so have to leave from time to time), and we want to prepare ourselves to do the sponsorhip. we already have joint bank account, soon we will change apartment agreement and we will put my name there, but what else to show that our relationship is real?
our friend suggested collecting bills from restaurants whenever we r going out. Any other ideas? Probably pictures from family events, like weddings etc., but this does not happen very often.

Please, share anything u think it may be helpful.

best,
Ashia

 

[starry101]

First for common law, you need to be living together for 12 months, without breaks. Since you've only been living together since Jan, next Jan is the earliest you can apply (depending on how long the breaks were). Anything that shows joint expenses is good, I'm not really sure how a restaurant bill shows that it was you two together, but cable, phone, utility bills with both your names work (we had vet bills with both our names on it). Photos are good, especially of family events, like Christmas so make sure you have enough variety of those (quality is better than quantity). Don't forget letters from family/friends about your relationship. You can add things like e-mails/messages to each other that are dated. Also, if you have any mail that was sent to both of you since the envelop will have a date from the postmark.

 

[Rob_TO]

Hi,

me and my partner are preparing to sponsoring common-law partner. he is canadian, i am polish.

We live together since january, with some breaks (i had to go to Europe, job related stuff, also i'm as a visitor in Canada, working now on my IEC application, so have to leave from time to time), and we want to prepare ourselves to do the sponsorhip. we already have joint bank account, soon we will change apartment agreement and we will put my name there, but what else to show that our relationship is real?
our friend suggested collecting bills from restaurants whenever we r going out. Any other ideas? Probably pictures from family events, like weddings etc., but this does not happen very often.

Please, share anything u think it may be helpful.

As was mentioned to you, you won't qualify for common-law until January 2014, and only then can you send in your application.

Also what kind of "breaks" are you talking about when you went back to Europe? 1 or 2 weeks? A month or more? Any trip you took to Europe for over 3-4 weeks or longer, COULD be viewed as a break in the cohabitation by CIC as they might say you were in fact "living" for that time in Europe. If you post exactly your time together and apart since January, perhaps people could advise better.

For proofs, remember you don't just need proofs of relationship, but also proof that you have been living together since January. Does your apartment/rental agreement now have your name on it? Did you get mail dating back from January at this address?

A joint bank account helps. Also a joint credit card or supplemental card in the other partners name helps, as well as getting some life insurance with each other listed as beneficiary. And as starry mentioned, lots of photos and letters from friends/family (you will require at least 2 statutory/certified testimonial letters).

 

[ashia]

ok, thanks.
yes, I know we can start application from next January, but I want to start collecting pictures and stuff like this.

my trip to Europe was job & school connected (Im making PhD, have to visit my school from time to time), 3 weeks, I was in 2 countries then. we both work in film business, so: many trips, not few days, but few weeks always, even few months can happen. we can't avoid this, but I also got an advise that we should show it's common thing in our job - showing other, previous trips, job connected.

my name is not yet on rental agreement, we didn't think about it. that's why i'm here - to ask we have this joint bank account, rental agreement we will try to change since next month - hopefully a landlord will not use it to rise our fee :/

with testimonial letters we won't have a problem, already few people said they will write something about us.

with letters we didn;t know and I got some mails... addressed to my partner. but they are from Poland, maybe I can use them? better to have new ones, I know

ok, thanks a lot. probably will have more questions in next weeks/months, while reading more and preparing