Sponsoring Japanese citizen through the Manila office - please share!

[gt_65]

Hello
For anyone sponsoring their Japanese spouse and processing outland applications through the Manila VO, can you please share your timeline/experience?
Also, did you have a PPR (passport request) or is Japan exempt?

Thanks!

 

[roomonfire23]

It took us a little over a year (including the strike last summer). Probably would have been closer to 8-9 months without the strike.

You won't have to send a passport, because Japan is visa exempt.

 

[gt_65]

Thanks for the reply!
Does that include the 1 month for sponsorship?

Did your application go straight to Decision Made?

 

[roomonfire23]

Yes, including SA. No, it went to in-process first.

Good luck and be patient.

 

[gt_65]

We will try - thank you!

 

[scosan]

We're at 15 months and counting. I'm beginning to lose patience. When we applied in Sept 2012 the wait time was listed at 9 months. Then the strike. Then expired medicals. Now the holidays and Yolanda victims (no problem with that but put some more damn resources into it!). Going to see my member of parliament on January 2.

 

[gt_65]

Wow! That's insane -especially since there are so many applications after yours that have already been approved for Visa's. Your spouse is a Japanese citizen? Are you both living in Japan?

 

[scosan]

Yes, my wife is Japanese. We have been married 12 years with 2 children who are now Canadian citizens (born in USA). We lived in California for 11 years and are now in Alberta. You're right there are many many applications which have been approved after ours, some from the spring. There is no real reason for our delay - all you'll get out of them is that 'each application is different'. Sometimes the squeaky wheel gets the oil; it's like they forget about your application until you remind them that you're still waiting!

 

[JRPW]

scosan,

I know how you feel. My Japanese wife and I have been waiting since October 2012. We got tired of waiting in Japan, so we decided to come back to Canada to wait out the process. When we landed at Calgary on December 4, the immigration agent took pity on us, I think, and gave my wife a one year visitors visa. My wife just had her re-med last Saturday. Tell me how the meeting goes with your MP. I have been in contact with mine, but nothing has really come of it. I hope the VOs are enjoying their pay raises that they thought they "deserved."

 

[ksin86]

Thanks for all the info guys.

We just sent ours on December 2nd. It was received as per tracking on December 5th.

I'm Canadian (parents are Japanese), she's Japanese (born in Japan). We both met in Canada and then moved to Japan.
Been living together for the past couple years and send application in as common-law status. I'm assuming our status won't affect our application too much.

No AOR yet. See how it goes!

 

[scosan]

JRPW,

Your application is not far behind mine. At least we know there is some consistency in the ridiculous amount of time this has taken. One positive is that visitor visa renewals have been easy. We just received a 1 year extension. (God help us if it takes that long). The part that ticks me off the most is we are paying for a service we're not getting - pretty fed up with this whole process. It would be very nice to get Alberta health care. Someone took pity on my wife at the DMV and gave her a 1 year drivers license though! (her California license was about to expire).

Scosan

 

[JRPW]

ksin86,

No worries. We received our AOR after a month (that's the average processing time). After that, nothing until May 2013 when Manila needed more docs. This whole process has been frustrating.

 

[JRPW]

scosan,

Yep, I know. You would think that the visa-exempt countries that have to send their applications to Manila (Japan, South Korea) would get their visas processed faster.

 

[gt_65]

Scosan, Ksin86 - so very frustrating! Feeling for you and keeping my fingers crossed you won't have to wait much longer.

 

[Tanli]

Hi I'm Canadian and sponsoring my Japanese husband through the Manilla visa office.

Our application to sponsor was received by Mississauga on July 15th 2013 and I was approved as a sponsor on Aug 15th 2013. The email they sent said they would transfer our file to Manilla. Since then we have not heard anything. I emailed them in October to see if Manilla had received our application and they sent us an automated response that because we are still within the standard waiting period we cannot ask any questions about our application. It's very frustrating and ridiculous that we have to wait 14 months before I can ask the question of whether or not they received our file. I have a feeling that our application is either lost in the mail or sitting on a shelf collecting dust. Can someone with experience tell me if they will send us an email when Manilla starts processing my husbands application? It's been 5 months now and no word.