US outland applicants' thread :)

[jamsham12]

quick question guys! Who receives the COPR? The sponsor or the spouse? I know for sure it's the spouse I could be wrong?

The person being sponsored receives the COPR.

 

[MrGmovestoCA]

Hello All,

I am about to send in my Sponsorship application. I am an American Citizen and I am married to a Canadian Citizen. The only thing I don't have is the FBI police certificate. I sent that application certified mail last week to FBI. But it takes 12-16 weeks to turn it in. I understand that you must send the application with all supporting docs. Any advice on how to proceed with the application. Can I submit proof of mailing along with a letter stating the long wait time for the police certificate (PC) in lieu of the actual certificate? To me I don't want to lose 3 months on this application process (wife is pregnant with our 1st and every month counts). Will sending the PC separately delay processing? How do I send in the certificate once I get it without a case number? Thanks for all the help. It looks like this will be a long journey and I would appreciate all the support and advice from this group as you all are going through the same arduous process.

Regards,

G

 

[maledil]

Hi all I'm having trouble with the forum not letting me add a topic. Hoping if I comment on here it will.

 

[ChellyCat]

Hello All,

I am about to send in my Sponsorship application. I am an American Citizen and I am married to a Canadian Citizen. The only thing I don't have is the FBI police certificate. I sent that application certified mail last week to FBI. But it takes 12-16 weeks to turn it in. I understand that you must send the application with all supporting docs. Any advice on how to proceed with the application. Can I submit proof of mailing along with a letter stating the long wait time for the police certificate (PC) in lieu of the actual certificate? To me I don't want to lose 3 months on this application process (wife is pregnant with our 1st and every month counts). Will sending the PC separately delay processing? How do I send in the certificate once I get it without a case number? Thanks for all the help. It looks like this will be a long journey and I would appreciate all the support and advice from this group as you all are going through the same arduous process.

Regards,

G

You can send your app without it; just include a letter stating you have sent off the prints and are waiting on the report. I personally didn't send my FBI report until... 4-5 months after I applied? I already had SA, however, so I was able to send it to Ottawa no problem. Good luck!

 

[Aquakitty]

Hello All,

I am about to send in my Sponsorship application. I am an American Citizen and I am married to a Canadian Citizen. The only thing I don't have is the FBI police certificate. I sent that application certified mail last week to FBI. But it takes 12-16 weeks to turn it in. I understand that you must send the application with all supporting docs. Any advice on how to proceed with the application. Can I submit proof of mailing along with a letter stating the long wait time for the police certificate (PC) in lieu of the actual certificate? To me I don't want to lose 3 months on this application process (wife is pregnant with our 1st and every month counts). Will sending the PC separately delay processing? How do I send in the certificate once I get it without a case number? Thanks for all the help. It looks like this will be a long journey and I would appreciate all the support and advice from this group as you all are going through the same arduous process.

Regards,

G

You will likely get AOR (application acknowledgement of receipt) and SA (sponsorship approval) before you get the FBI Police Certificate so you will have an application number. Yes this process is stressful for everyone but you'll get through it!

 

[CMLR]

I see we Finally got DM. My husband worries that it might not be a good news, he has all alone thought the worst never thinking best case. I however after being on this sight for over a year know that DM is good news. We originally applied Inland thinking it was best case scenario but even after they gave us AOP they sent back the application, they had it for 4 months before sending it back. That however was a good thing in the long run as we turned right around and resent in our applications as outland. They received our outland application on October 16, 2014 and today August 23, 2015 it has gone to DM. Now to get my COPR so I can land. So nice to be done other than the landing piece.

 

[Aquakitty]

I see we Finally got DM. My husband worries that it might not be a good news, he has all alone thought the worst never thinking best case. I however after being on this sight for over a year know that DM is good news. We originally applied Inland thinking it was best case scenario but even after they gave us AOP they sent back the application, they had it for 4 months before sending it back. That however was a good thing in the long run as we turned right around and resent in our applications as outland. They received our outland application on October 16, 2014 and today August 23, 2015 it has gone to DM. Now to get my COPR so I can land. So nice to be done other than the landing piece.

Why did they send back the inland app? I think if we did not withdraw ours that would have happened as well as we did not know what we were doing at the time. Congrats on your DM!

 

[CMLR]

Aquakitty. CIC sent our inland app back saying that not all the forms were in the application. The ones they said were not there were clearly there right in the envelope they sent back to us. Besides at one point they had sent one form back because although I had signed it I signed it in the wrong place. At that point if something was missing they would have asked for it or sent the entire application back. When we sent the form back in, signed in the right place very soon after we got the AOP so we know everything was there and all was signed and done correctly. In a way I am glad though. I know it wasted 4 months that could have been months I was here in Canada and able to work but at least their sending it back made us decide to change to outland. They are still 2 months out from working on what would have been our inland application date so I am grateful that we went with outland.

Wondering how long it will take to get my COPR so I can flagpole and finally get my life back. I have been here in Canada as a visitor for over 2 years now. It took us a while to gather everything for the first application thankfully I was able to get extensions on my visitors status. But I am so ready to be able to do something worthwhile in life again!

 

[ChellyCat]

Aquakitty. CIC sent our inland app back saying that not all the forms were in the application. The ones they said were not there were clearly there right in the envelope they sent back to us. Besides at one point they had sent one form back because although I had signed it I signed it in the wrong place. At that point if something was missing they would have asked for it or sent the entire application back. When we sent the form back in, signed in the right place very soon after we got the AOP so we know everything was there and all was signed and done correctly. In a way I am glad though. I know it wasted 4 months that could have been months I was here in Canada and able to work but at least their sending it back made us decide to change to outland. They are still 2 months out from working on what would have been our inland application date so I am grateful that we went with outland.

Wondering how long it will take to get my COPR so I can flagpole and finally get my life back. I have been here in Canada as a visitor for over 2 years now. It took us a while to gather everything for the first application thankfully I was able to get extensions on my visitors status. But I am so ready to be able to do something worthwhile in life again!

*hugs* I totally understand where you're coming from. I've also been on a visitor visa for a year and some days I just can't take it. I know some have it worse- they have to be apart from their families while they wait, at least I can be here with my boyfriend... But I feel like at my age (23), all my friends are moving on and getting their first professional jobs and such, and I'm just *stuck*. My life is essentially on hiatus while I wait for CIC. It really gets to me some days. I know this was my choice, and I don't regret it for a second, but the days are really, really hard.

 

[Dave4236]

Out of left field it all changed for me.

I have an application in. It is at the In Process point and my medical expired and need to do another. We have lived in the US for 31 years and are returning again to Canada. I was a Landed Immigrant in 1977. We were told several years ago by Border Service that I would need a new PR application. I did send in a copy of the original landing that was stamped with my sponsored immigration application.

We took a weeks vacation to visit our family in Canada and I stopped in at the Border on Saturday morning to get some clarifications from them. The gentleman I talked to, after hearing only a little of my questions and story, said that my original landing was still valid. There is this "exemption" on time out of the Canada if you are with your Canadian spouse. No time limit! And after 31 years away my original landing is good! He spent about an hour looking at records on line and stamped my current US passport with the Canadian Border Service stamp and wrote in PR approved and then the 1977 date. He included his reference ID.

So I "think" this means that I can just "come back" to Canada now any time. He said he put lots of notes into my computer file and also even apologized that it had not been caught before.

So my question now is how do I STOP the process with CIC and get at least some of that money paid back?

Also, what does this mean for getting a PR card? I see the same exemption stuff, but other things seem to put me into some Catch22 situations. Any ideas?

 

[CMLR]

Dave, I am not sure of things as you said your original landing was in 1977 which might make a difference, but from what I have read on the CIC site if a PR has not been in Canada for at least 2 years out of every 5 years they no longer hold Residency in Canada. I wonder if your landing is still considered good but that something else has to be done for PR since you have been out of Canada for so many years. I hope that your PR is still good but it does seems strange compared to things I have read. Please, let us all know once you know for sure as I know I would like to be able to live in both the USA and Canada with my husband as we get closer to retirement age, we have less than 13 years until we could retire on either side of the border.

 

[CMLR]

Chellycat, Yes the time has gone so slowly and although I am middle aged so not wanting to start my career I miss the person I once was in the US. I know I cannot be that same person here as I was a locally elected person in my community which I cannot do here since I won't be a citizen. Still I would like to get on with what skills I have which are in human service work and schools, not a teacher though, I love the work I have done and look forward to doing it again even if in a different way. Good luck and may your application go through in shorter than normal time so that you can get on with life as you plan it to be. Blessings

 

[stardt]

Hello All,

I am about to send in my Sponsorship application. I am an American Citizen and I am married to a Canadian Citizen. The only thing I don't have is the FBI police certificate. I sent that application certified mail last week to FBI. But it takes 12-16 weeks to turn it in. I understand that you must send the application with all supporting docs. Any advice on how to proceed with the application. Can I submit proof of mailing along with a letter stating the long wait time for the police certificate (PC) in lieu of the actual certificate? To me I don't want to lose 3 months on this application process (wife is pregnant with our 1st and every month counts). Will sending the PC separately delay processing? How do I send in the certificate once I get it without a case number? Thanks for all the help. It looks like this will be a long journey and I would appreciate all the support and advice from this group as you all are going through the same arduous process.

Regards,

G

Hey G,

Just wanted to say my wife and I did this exact same thing and so far it's been ok. We sent our app in without FBI cert for the same reason on May 29 2015 and included a letter explaining this, plus a photocopy of the USPS receipt saying it was sent via whatever the kind of mail is in the US where they have to sign for it/it gets tracked. We also included a photo of the USPS lady holding the letter right before it was mailed with postage on it and everything (addressed to FBI)!

We got AOR and SA with no problem and my app forwarded to Ottawa. About 2 weeks after I got AOR I sent the FBI report to Ottawa with a letter explaining everything and included every detail (UCI #, Category, Application number, our names and dates of birth and even a timeline of the events so far like AOR and SA). We sent the FBI report via Purolator which I highly recommend because then it gets there ASAP and you get the name of whoever signed for it on record so if they say thye didn't get it in the future you can say "this piece of proof says you did" or at least have peace of mind knowing it arrive. Canada post stresses me out.

Not sure how it will go but I also sent an email to cpc ottawa asking if they got the document. Haven't heard back. Planning to call tomorrow. I think the only thing to worry about is the document joining up with the rest of your file so that's the reason for sending it after you get SA and they tell you where your app is headed next.

 

[deweysmith]

Dave, I am not sure of things as you said your original landing was in 1977 which might make a difference, but from what I have read on the CIC site if a PR has not been in Canada for at least 2 years out of every 5 years they no longer hold Residency in Canada. I wonder if your landing is still considered good but that something else has to be done for PR since you have been out of Canada for so many years. I hope that your PR is still good but it does seems strange compared to things I have read. Please, let us all know once you know for sure as I know I would like to be able to live in both the USA and Canada with my husband as we get closer to retirement age, we have less than 13 years until we could retire on either side of the border.

A PR is exempt from the Residency requirement if living abroad with their Canadian Citizen spouse.

Dave, you should be able to send a withdrawal request. Check out this page, or call the Call Centre. They can't do it over the phone, but they can point you in the right direction.

 

[Ineffable]

Sorry for reposting this, but I didn't see a response/answer, so I'm hoping maybe one of you knows. :-*

"Hi all,

Question for you regarding address change:

I am currently "visiting" my wife in Canada (and plan on renewing my visitor visa until my PR is approved).

My address on ECAS is my father's home address back in the U.S. He's selling his house, and thus I need to change the address.

Can I change my address to my wife's Canadian address without raising suspicion? And is the address on ECAS where the CIC would send my future paperwork once approved?

Thank you in advance!"