Hi - I just wanted to add a message to this thread so whoever can provide some advice thanks in advance.
The 6 outstanding driving tickets my boyfriend has from his time in Australia (2008-2010) amount to AUD $955. I have been in touch with the office in Brisbane to get this cleared and they have set up a repayment plan over 12 months, $80 per month to start April. I have contacted an immigration consultant in Toronto just for a bit of knowledgeable advice and asked if she thought providing evidence to the visa processing office in Ottowa that this outstanding debt is now being paid off was worth while. After she heard the amount was AUD $895 she suggested just paying it off in one lump sum (seeing as its a relative small amount for a debt) and providing evidence by email to the visa processing office in Ottowa instead of letting them believe that we are doing nothing about this.
As there is no black and white rule about this I'm just looking for a bit of advice from any of you who can help. A few traffic tickets for speeding, driving without a seatbelt etc.... should not be grounds to refuse someone PR however.....it doesn't reflect well on anybody to have outstanding debt. Lots of people have credit card debt, loans etc.... and it's all fine as long as you pay it off. This traffic history report is going to show on paper that my boyfriend has ignored some outstanding debt so my worry is whoever is looking at our application will have the authority to make the decision to refuse our PR based on that.
Do you think sending through confirmation of a direct debit is enough with a monthly payment plan starting from this month? Or will they want to see it cleared in one lump sum?
This is something relating to our application that we can control so rather than wait and see what happens, and then potentially get refused because of it, I'd prefer to nip it in the bud now and have one less thing to worry about. We received our email on the 24th Jan saying the application was processing to the office in Ottowa and based on timelines of a lot of my friends who got their PR in the last few weeks we should have an email about our medical (fingers crossed) by end of July/start of August.
If its likely to be something that could potentially affect our application then I will pay it no questions asked. But if it's not something that can affect their decision making then we will stick with the direct debit.
Thanks for your advice in advance!