Overwhelmed!!

[CaroM8]

So many pictures, receipts, chat logs, Facebook posts etc!!!

So much "evidence" to go through, I am overwhelmed and keep questioning myself as to what is relevant for the "Proof of Relationship" part of our application. I don't want to send too much, and most of it be shredded anyway. But too little can be detrimental.

So far I have a few pictures from the beginning of our relationship, special occasions, wedding pictures and honeymoon pictures.
What about receipts? What is relevant? Proof of every little outing we've been on. Every museum and movie night?

Pulling my hair out at this point; and not just the grey ones!

 

[canadianwoman]

What country is the applicant from? If it is a first-world country, you need less evidence. Then, does your relationship have red flags, such as a huge age difference? The more in common the two of you have, the less evidence you need.

So for example, for an applicant from the USA, I would not bother including proof of date nights.

Try to get the most important proof first, and then if it looks to you like there is not enough, you can start including things like receipts. Important things are proof of communication if you are living apart, proof of cohabitation if you are living together, proof of joint finances, proof of travel to see one another, photos from the length of your relationship.

 

[CaroM8]

What country is the applicant from? If it is a first-world country, you need less evidence. Then, does your relationship have red flags, such as a huge age difference? The more in common the two of you have, the less evidence you need.

So for example, for an applicant from the USA, I would not bother including proof of date nights.

Try to get the most important proof first, and then if it looks to you like there is not enough, you can start including things like receipts. Important things are proof of communication if you are living apart, proof of cohabitation if you are living together, proof of joint finances, proof of travel to see one another, photos from the length of your relationship.

Thank you for your answer!

My husband is from Guatemala, I am Canadian citizen. I am 28 and he is 32. We met while I was traveling in Central America and volunteered at the place where he works. We have been together since then, both in Guatemala and in Canada. But mostly in Guatemala. I can provide travel itineraries to prove this. Our chat logs are a bit tricky.. since we have been physically together for almost 2 years, our texts are pretty mundane stuff like "Can you pick up milk on your way home later?" Haha!

Our application seems pretty straightforward to me... I have tons of information, just having a hard time narrowing it down to the important stuff.

 

[kks87]

What about receipts? What is relevant? Proof of every little outing we've been on. Every museum and movie night?

For our application, I tried to include some receipts for a variety of things across the times of my visits - coffee dates, dinner, supermarket, movie tickets, museum tickets, bus tickets with our names, hotel receipts with both our names (I would ask hotels to add the extra name when possible)

I didn't have too many because there was only a few trips to see my husband that we attempted to keep track of these receipts. I organized it by 1 page of coffee receipts (ie 4-6), 1 page supermarket, 1 page tickets from outings for each time I visited.

Our representative suggested it would be helpful to have bank and credit card statements showing location of purchases to help prove I was actually there when I said I was as well, since anyone can put together receipts without actually being in the place you say you are.

I know we went a bit overboard on other proof (whatsapp chats - about 70 pages, 150 photos), but our application was approved within 3 months at the Rome office, so I don't think it slowed them down by going through a lot of evidence. You don't want to cut out more than you are comfortable with and then sit and worry about it after you send in the app, it's stressful enough without adding extra reasons.

 

[CaroM8]

70 pages of chat and 150 pictures? That seems like a lot!! Haha

 

[Ponga]

So many pictures, receipts, chat logs, Facebook posts etc!!!

So much "evidence" to go through, I am overwhelmed and keep questioning myself as to what is relevant for the "Proof of Relationship" part of our application. I don't want to send too much, and most of it be shredded anyway. But too little can be detrimental.

Not [entirely] true. If CIC feels that they need more proof, this will request more. They will NOT deny the application without asking for more proof. It would, however, delay the processing but would not be truly detrimental to your application...just a pain in the arse.

I suggest you focus on quality, versus quantity. For example, don't send multiple photos from the same day/event. This would also apply to emails, text messages, chats, etc..

Breathe!

FYI, we sent waaaaayyyy more proof than we really needed. I'm sure the poor sloth that had to scan everything is still cursing our names! LOL!
It's no wonder, because when you're assembling everything you have no idea how much they really need to see.

 

[CaroM8]

What I've been doing also is taking screen shots of some Facebook posts and pictures that we have done in the past, and including some of the comments and "likes" from our friends and family. Is that a good idea? To me it just showed that our relationship is public and known to others... right?

 

[Ponga]

Sure...why not, right?

Don't be afraid to include a couple of messages/emails from one of your `spats', because real couples do argue from time to time.

 

[Ay Ne]

Longer relationships continues, less pictures we took...
I read some topics and people sending insanely amount of photos and we were stressed out.
I ended up sending less than 15 photos. Photos of Our friend's wedding, trip to my home country, with my parents, anniversary photos etc. We are in common law
We sent our application at very last minute and we couldn't even include letter from our family or friends. We sent joint bank statement, insurance with our name on it, medical bill together, car insurance paper, pretty much something official paper that has both our name on it together. I sent a receipt of our airline ticket(had same booking# too) as an evidence too. So we didn't send whole a lot of evidences but we thought "this is true and legit relationship why are we worried and stressed out?" It went perfectly fine and we landed 2 weeks ago.

Good luck and don't stress yourself too much

 

[CaroM8]

Longer relationships continues, less pictures we took...
I read some topics and people sending insanely amount of photos and we were stressed out.
I ended up sending less than 15 photos. Photos of Our friend's wedding, trip to my home country, with my parents, anniversary photos etc. We are in common law
We sent our application at very last minute and we couldn't even include letter from our family or friends. We sent joint bank statement, insurance with our name on it, medical bill together, car insurance paper, pretty much something official paper that has both our name on it together. I sent a receipt of our airline ticket(had same booking# too) as an evidence too. So we didn't send whole a lot of evidences but we thought "this is true and legit relationship why are we worried and stressed out?" It went perfectly fine and we landed 2 weeks ago.

Good luck and don't stress yourself too much

Thank you! I feel better after reading this!

I hope we don't need to much "official" stuff like insurance and bills with our names. We've been living pretty nomadically since the beginning of our relationship and don't have things like that. I did add my husband as beneficiary with the bank papers. Obviously we have our marriage certificate...