Recieved Ontario marriage certificate! A few questions

[sbwv09]

It only took 20 days from our wedding to get our official marriage certificate! We were married April 3rd, requested them April 9th and they were processed on the 20th and in hand by the 23rd!! Thanks to Asta for giving me the advice to request the documents online as soon as possible!

I have a couple of questions regarding this:

1-I got the 'long' and 'short' official copies. Does it matter which one goes in? They are both 'official' marriage certificates.
2-For the region specific immigrant guide (USA), it says copies of everything except the police certificate unless 'otherwise specified'. I"m a bit confused.. under 'Identity and Civil Status Documents' it doesn't say 'copy' of marriage certificate, it just says 'marriage certificate'. So do I just put in the original? What about the birth certificate? Do I need to include my birth certificate if nobody is coming but myself and we have no children?
3-Also under the Identity and Civil Documents, it says if my spouse is a Canadian citizen, to include his citizenship certificate or PR visa. He is Canadian born and he is my sponsor, so do I have to worry about that part?

Thanks!

 

[ritosgirl]

hello sbwv09!

for the marriage certificates, i'm pretty sure that i sent in the original long copy, and photo copied the short version. for the birth certificate, just photo copy will suffice. don't send the original. and yeah, because your husband is born in canada you don't need to worry about the citizen certificate of pr visa.. or any of that stuff.

hope this answers your questions!!

 

[ColorMePanda]

Would a certified copy of the marriage certificate suffice?

About the birth certificate, my mom has the original and I do not have even a copy of it so what I did was call and ask her to have it copied front and back at our lawyer's office and had them notarize it, verifying it was an official copy of the original birth certificate.

Oh and congrats on getting your marriage certificate back so fast. I know that a lot people who marry in Ontario wait for 3 or so months until they retrieve theirs. You were also lucky to receive your FBI clearance back fast or I think it was you who did. You live in WV right? Lol. Anyway, seems like things are going smooth and quick for you with preparation so maybe it is a good sign that things will go just as fast once you submit it. When are you sending yours off?

 

[ritosgirl]

@ colormepanda...

i'm just looking at appendix A - document checklist, and it says that you can send photocopies of your marriage certificate, and your birth certificate. the only time that you need to have it notarized/certified is if the documents are not in english or french. the only "originals" they are expecting are the immigration forms, and if they want the original for anything else, it will say specifically that they want it.

 

[iarblue]

Birth certificates must be in long form.

 

[ColorMePanda]

Birth certificates must be in long form.

And what if your birth certificate was never a long form one?
Where does it state this?

And thank you ritosgirl but I already have it notarized anyway and I am related to our lawyer so she got it for free anyway. I figured the notarizing of it, didn't hurt. And we only need a regular photocopy of the marriage certificate correct?

 

[ritosgirl]

i didn't send in my husbands birth certificate at all... and they didn't ever ask for it. it must have not been too much of an issue as he received his passport with visa last week!

and... yep, just a regular ol' photocopy will be sufficient. i ordered several copies of the marriage certificate for immigration purposes. so, i photocopied and sent in an original. but, really... they just need a photocopy.

 

[ColorMePanda]

Thank you for all your help ritosgirl. It means a lot.
And congratulations on your husband receiving the visa. (I am assuming your husband is the applicant)

 

[sbwv09]

ritos: Thanks! I may just send the original long copy anyway, since I, like you, ordered more than one copy

Panda: I know.. I hope it's a sign of things to come! I am in WV, pretty close to the FBI center, so I don't know how much that helped. I was pretty worried about the marriage certificate but I got the advice on here to ask for it right after the wedding and they would just send it along as soon as it was registered, and so they did! I've been praying a lot about everything so maybe that's helping I'm probably gonna send everything off early May.. we're still waiting for hubby's option C and a couple of letters of support from family. I'll be in Canada for a weekend around the 7th so I'm hoping that everything will be ready then so I can take care of it myself

Also, if you needed a copy of your birth certificate, it's not very hard to obtain. I ordered mine and it took about a week, so if you did need an original copy for some reason, it shouldn't be too hard Thanks everyone!