Do I declare girlfriend and her children as part of my permanent residency appl?

[fishferbrains]

Hello there,

I've been invited to apply for permanent residency through the express entry program. For the last 3 years I've been sharing an apartment with my Canadian citizen girlfriend and her children that she shares custody with every other week.

My questions are:
- Must I declare her as a common-law spouse? Are there any reasons to (or not to) declare her?
- Should I declare her children as my step-children even though I'm not a legal guardian of either of them?

Thanks in advance for the help!

 

[Rob_TO]

I've been invited to apply for permanent residency through the express entry program. For the last 3 years I've been sharing an apartment with my Canadian citizen girlfriend and her children that she shares custody with every other week.

My questions are:
- Must I declare her as a common-law spouse? Are there any reasons to (or not to) declare her?

Yes. You officially became common-law after 12 months of living together. This is not a choice, common-law status happens automatically after cohabiting with a partner for 12 months.

She could have sponsored you for PR under family class back when you became common-law as well.

Hopefully both of you changed your tax status with CRA to common-law back when you reached the 12 months, and have been doing taxes as such for the past few years, else you've been committing tax fraud.

Should I declare her children as my step-children even though I'm not a legal guardian of either of them?

No, I don't think so.

 

[fishferbrains]

Thanks for the update - greatly appreciated.

Yikes - we haven't changed our tax status yet - we're both contributing at the highest tax rate - but will follow-up on this immediately. Is there some place to read-up on the implications/changes needed?

 

[Rob_TO]

Thanks for the update - greatly appreciated.

Yikes - we haven't changed our tax status yet - we're both contributing at the highest tax rate - but will follow-up on this immediately. Is there some place to read-up on the implications/changes needed?

The only real implication is the calculation of the child benefit, HST/GST rebates, and any other payments she may be receiving. CRA uses "family income" to calculate this. So for example if she's been getting child payments under her single income, but would have gotten a lower amount when combined with your income for a "family income", then CRA will send her a bill to pay back all the extra amount she got back dated to the date you became common-law.

If she's already making a high income so isn't getting much child payments to begin with, the penalty here could be minimized.

You can do a voluntary re-assessment of previous years taxes to correct things like this, but considering you became common-law quite a while ago and child benefit rules have changed a lot over that time, it may be best to consult with a good income tax accountant on how best to do this.

 

[fishferbrains]

Awesome - thank you again Rob!