Submitting Unrequested Additional Proof of Relationship

[StellaArtois]

Background:
I am a Canadian citizen residing in Canada sponsoring my U.S. citizen husband residing in the US. Our lawyer helped us file our application approximately 6 months ago (detailed timeline in my signature), and is our designated representative.

So far everything is going as expected, and our lawyer told us our application would likely take over 12 months to process since we also submitted a criminal rehabilitation application to go with it. We haven't had an update on our application in about 3 months. The most recent activity was that our file was transferred to the Los Angeles VO.

Our lawyer is currently telling us that now is a good time to submit additional proof of ongoing relationship (e.g., plane tickets from our visits after our original application submission, additional pictures together in the past 6 months) even though the IRCC has not requested any additional documentation from us of any sort at this point.

I have heard on this forum, however, that applicants should not submit additional documentation unless requested by IRCC (or unless there has been a change in personal or professional status/history). We are conflicted as to what to do since our lawyer recommends the opposite. Our lawyer has years of experience as an immigration lawyer and up to now we have not had any issues following her advice...

Actual Questions:
Has anyone ever submitted additional proof of relationship while waiting for their application to be processed despite that additional documents were not requested by the IRCC (or does anyone know any threads to refer me to)? Please share your experiences.

Does anyone have specific explanations for why it is not good to submit unrequested additional proof of relationship after submitting the original application?

Thank you for you time in addressing my questions!

 

[alaria]

Background:
I am a Canadian citizen residing in Canada sponsoring my U.S. citizen husband residing in the US. Our lawyer helped us file our application approximately 6 months ago (detailed timeline in my signature), and is our designated representative.

So far everything is going as expected, and our lawyer told us our application would likely take over 12 months to process since we also submitted a criminal rehabilitation application to go with it. We haven't had an update on our application in about 3 months. The most recent activity was that our file was transferred to the Los Angeles VO.

Our lawyer is currently telling us that now is a good time to submit additional proof of ongoing relationship (e.g., plane tickets from our visits after our original application submission, additional pictures together in the past 6 months) even though the IRCC has not requested any additional documentation from us of any sort at this point.

I have heard on this forum, however, that applicants should not submit additional documentation unless requested by IRCC (or unless there has been a change in personal or professional status/history). We are conflicted as to what to do since our lawyer recommends the opposite. Our lawyer has years of experience as an immigration lawyer and up to now we have not had any issues following her advice...

Actual Questions:
Has anyone ever submitted additional proof of relationship while waiting for their application to be processed despite that additional documents were not requested by the IRCC (or does anyone know any threads to refer me to)? Please share your experiences.

Does anyone have specific explanations for why it is not good to submit unrequested additional proof of relationship after submitting the original application?

Thank you for you time in addressing my questions!

Sending additional proof never hurts and might be a good idea. As you mentioned, IRCC is interested to see not only the original proof but also the ongoing, that the relationship actually exists after submitting an application. If you have something to show them, especially joint trips, go for it.

 

[keesio]

The most recent activity was that our file was transferred to the Los Angeles VO.

In the past, that has meant that the application is considered "non-standard" (makes sense give the criminal rehabilitation application). It is also a good possibility that an interview will be required.

Does anyone have specific explanations for why it is not good to submit unrequested additional proof of relationship after submitting the original application?

I don't think it will hurt as long as you don't overwhelm them with a ton of trivial proof (like sending in 200 pages of skype chat logs). Go for quality, not quantity.

 

[StellaArtois]

Thank you for your replies. So far you guys have been in support of what our lawyer recommended, which is reassuring me.
I guess I was expecting more posts speaking out against submitting documentation when it is unrequested by the IRCC.

When I get updates after I've submitted these additional proofs, I'll post about my experience here in case anyone else is thinking of doing this. Will see how long that takes...

 

[StellaArtois]

Just an update that our lawyer submitted additional proofs of our relationship on January 18, 2020 through webform.

Our proofs included...

-9 pages of messaging (we sampled from 1-2 conversations from each month after our original application submission in May 2019)
-boarding passes from flights for visits (a total of 3 round trips, plus a round trip flight receipt for 1 upcoming visit)
-17 PayPal money transfers (a couple each month)
-4 social media posts of our time together (all SnapChat stories; my husband has no social media and I am involved in very little)

As our lawyer stated, it would be better if we had photos taken of us together with our family and friends, but we both don't really like photos and hadn't taken any :x

In any case, on January 22, 2020, the visa office processing our application (which apparently is NY) replied to our lawyer with an e-mail stating the following:

"We confirm receipt of your documents."

This is the first time we've heard from a US visa office since our file was transferred to LA in August 2019 (they never sent us any communication stating our application was transferred to NY). Even that ultra short 6 word e-mail was nice to receive after 5 months of silence.

I'm still not sure why many users on this forum strongly recommend against submitting unrequested additional proof of relationship after submitting the original application. So far it doesn't seem like sending this additional proof in has had any negative effect on our application (though I will update if there is).

If anyone has an answer for why what we did as stated above is ill advised, please let me know because I am still curious about the reasoning.

In the meantime, back to waiting in silence...

 

[Userfriendly28]

Just an update that our lawyer submitted additional proofs of our relationship on January 18, 2020 through webform.

Our proofs included...

-9 pages of messaging (we sampled from 1-2 conversations from each month after our original application submission in May 2019)
-boarding passes from flights for visits (a total of 3 round trips, plus a round trip flight receipt for 1 upcoming visit)
-17 PayPal money transfers (a couple each month)
-4 social media posts of our time together (all SnapChat stories; my husband has no social media and I am involved in very little)

As our lawyer stated, it would be better if we had photos taken of us together with our family and friends, but we both don't really like photos and hadn't taken any :x

In any case, on January 22, 2020, the visa office processing our application (which apparently is NY) replied to our lawyer with an e-mail stating the following:

"We confirm receipt of your documents."

This is the first time we've heard from a US visa office since our file was transferred to LA in August 2019 (they never sent us any communication stating our application was transferred to NY). Even that ultra short 6 word e-mail was nice to receive after 5 months of silence.

I'm still not sure why many users on this forum strongly recommend against submitting unrequested additional proof of relationship after submitting the original application. So far it doesn't seem like sending this additional proof in has had any negative effect on our application (though I will update if there is).

If anyone has an answer for why what we did as stated above is ill advised, please let me know because I am still curious about the reasoning.

In the meantime, back to waiting in silence...

Let me know how it goes because myself I was thinking of doing the same but I wasn’t sure if it would be a negative impact on the application

 

[StellaArtois]

Let me know how it goes because myself I was thinking of doing the same but I wasn’t sure if it would be a negative impact on the application

Yeah for sure!

If it helps, our lawyer recommends submitting additional proofs of relationship 6 months after IRCC receives the application if PPR has not been received by that time.
From what I've seen of the 2019 statistics, on average about 50% of cases are processed within 6 months (though of course that's only possible for simple cases that don't have red flags), so hopefully yours is one of the quick ones and it'll be approved before that 6 month mark

 

[Userfriendly28]

Yeah for sure!

If it helps, our lawyer recommends submitting additional proofs of relationship 6 months after IRCC receives the application if PPR has not been received by that time.
From what I've seen of the 2019 statistics, on average about 50% of cases are processed within 6 months (though of course that's only possible for simple cases that don't have red flags), so hopefully yours is one of the quick ones and it'll be approved before that 6 month mark

Ya mine is not that’s why I was wondering how good of an idea it is to send more relationship proof just Incase but it’s nice to see you had a positive outlook. Did you ever get an email within those 6 months of your file being transferred before it went to New York ? Or it has been silence? I’m waiting for my file transfer mostly everyone in my month group got their file transferred and I’m here still waiting .... no email nothing since request for bio.

 

[StellaArtois]

Ya mine is not that’s why I was wondering how good of an idea it is to send more relationship proof just Incase but it’s nice to see you had a positive outlook. Did you ever get an email within those 6 months of your file being transferred before it went to New York ? Or it has been silence? I’m waiting for my file transfer mostly everyone in my month group got their file transferred and I’m here still waiting .... no email nothing since request for bio.

Ah I see, so we're together in the boat of complex applications with red flags eh.

Looks like our processing steps are going is a bit different from yours (you can see it in my signature if you want details), because you already got your biometrics request before your file was even transferred out of Sydney.
Our file was transferred from Sydney to Mississauga (which they did send us an e-mail to tell us this happened), then from Mississauga to the US visa office (which they also sent an e-mail to tell us our application was moved to LA, but they did not e-mail us to say it was subsequently moved from LA to NY) before we got the biometrics request (which interestingly the biometrics request came from the Mississauga office rather than the US visa office despite that our application was in the US at that point), but since the biometrics request we haven't heard anything.

I've heard of a few cases where all of the preliminary processing (medical, sponsor approval, biometrics) are done in Sydney rather than in Mississauga, so perhaps yours is one of those? If yours is a complex case, it will eventually be transferred to the applicant's local visa office anyways, so it's not a big deal if it skips over Mississauga.

 

[Userfriendly28]

Ah I see, so we're together in the boat of complex applications with red flags eh.

Looks like our processing steps are going is a bit different from yours (you can see it in my signature if you want details), because you already got your biometrics request before your file was even transferred out of Sydney.
Our file was transferred from Sydney to Mississauga (which they did send us an e-mail to tell us this happened), then from Mississauga to the US visa office (which they also sent an e-mail to tell us our application was moved to LA, but they did not e-mail us to say it was subsequently moved from LA to NY) before we got the biometrics request (which interestingly the biometrics request came from the Mississauga office rather than the US visa office despite that our application was in the US at that point), but since the biometrics request we haven't heard anything.

I've heard of a few cases where all of the preliminary processing (medical, sponsor approval, biometrics) are done in Sydney rather than in Mississauga, so perhaps yours is one of those? If yours is a complex case, it will eventually be transferred to the applicant's local visa office anyways, so it's not a big deal if it skips over Mississauga.

Ya mine will for sure skip over Mississauga the question is when ... i mean I’ve seen people waiting 5+ months to get a file transfer and some getting it transferred right after SA. I wonder if Sydney does any kind of checks meaning like criminality or eligibility or it just simply sits there waiting for a transfer. Plus I’m from QC just sent my application for csq and they finally charged my credit card after 6 weeks now we have to wait for that also witch may take anywhere from 4-5 even 6 months I hope it gets transferred and there’s movement soon. When did you apply ? What’s your time line ?

 

[StellaArtois]

Ya mine will for sure skip over Mississauga the question is when ... i mean I’ve seen people waiting 5+ months to get a file transfer and some getting it transferred right after SA. I wonder if Sydney does any kind of checks meaning like criminality or eligibility or it just simply sits there waiting for a transfer. Plus I’m from QC just sent my application for csq and they finally charged my credit card after 6 weeks now we have to wait for that also witch may take anywhere from 4-5 even 6 months I hope it gets transferred and there’s movement soon. When did you apply ? What’s your time line ?

Yeah it's hard to say; I've also seen it's all over the place for criminality - for some people it starts as soon as their application is received (ours was), while for others it's not started until after all the preliminary processing is done and they're doing the eligibility/authenticity of relationship assessment. It's quite mysterious and inconsistent ^^;

Ohh I didn't realize you're from Quebec. I haven't seen many of those cases so I have no idea what the timelines are like.

We sent in our application May 2019, and everything detailed is in my signature (click the grey area under my posts to expand it). Not many people have criminality in their application though, so our timeline is expected to be non-standard relative to the vast majority of users on this site.