Implied status for common law partner

[Kiwiprcanada]

Looking for some perspectives on conflicting advice.

My partner and I came to Canada on IEC visas, expiring this month. I applied for PR as the primary applicant, with my partner included on the application. Received AOR, and applied for BOWP. I did a SOWP for my partner at the same time. This was all squared away early last month so I am continuing working on implied status. My partner has applied for a visitor visa as our understanding was that only I benefit from implied status as their SOWP technically cannot be processed until my BOWP is approved (even though they were submitted together).

The problem: a friend-of-a-friend is an immigration lawyer and is ADAMANT that my partner benefits from implied status in our situation. I have seen threads on here that do not support that assertion and I cannot find anything from an offical source either.

Can anyone offer a perspective on that?

 

[tassioborges]

If your spouse applied to a BOWP, they can continue to work as state in the IRCC website:

You can stay in Canada, and may be able to keep working, under what's called implied status. That means the law implies you are a temporary resident. The implied status lasts until we decide on your new permit application. However, you must respect the following requirements:

If you applied for another work permit

• You must stay in Canada and meet the conditions of your original work permit. If you applied for a work permit extension before your work permit expired, you can keep working under the same conditions as your existing permit until we decide on your application.

Link: https://www.cic.gc.ca/english/helpcentre/answer.asp?qnum=188&top=17

If they did not apply for a new work permit, then they cannot work. If you still have time to submit a BOWP for them and they're eligible, you should do it before the current WP expires.

 

[nll]

I have been in this exact situation.

I was under the IEC program (Work Holiday Visa) and then applied for PR as a primary applicant with my common-law as a secondary applicant.

With my AOR, I applied for a BOWP.
I was the primary applicant and my common-law the secondary one. Together in the same application, exactly like our PR application.

I got PR before getting the BOWP but by doing so, we were both under implied status and we were both able to continue to work.

If you applied together for the BOWP, she's also under the implied status. But since you seems to have applied separately with a SOWP (I'm not familiar about that), I'm not sure that's the case...