Notarization of Declaration of Commonlaw union

[Boracay]

We are currently in Vietnam on vacation
She will be immigrating from The Philippines and she is a Filipino citizen.

When we go back to The Philippines we will only be together for a short amount of time and we have a lot to get accomplished from medical, police, national statistics office etc.

So we were thinking of getting the document notarized here in Vietnam
1. It will save time
2. Since divorce is not allowed in The Philippines and she is legally married, we're concerned that a notary may not want to notarize our common law union form and/or she can get in trouble.

Our question is will CIC find it odd that it was notarized in a different country?
Is it allowed?

Thanks!

[Fencesitter]

I'd give CIC a call in Canada to ask: 613-944-4000 (if you have access to a VPN with servers in the US or Canada it's free!!).

Anyway, I think your wife will need to take of the divorce before filling out the applications, as there are sections related to this that may cause trouble for you guys.

Good luck!

[Boracay]

She need not divorce as it's not possible in The Philippines, but we already know about all that and how it works with the application etc.

Just it being notarized in a  different country is the question!

Thanks for the advice though =)

[Kedeisha]

Normally people that have married phillipines spouse go the conjugal route thats the norm from what i read on the website so you may try a common law/conjugal route

I dont believe it will be an issue once that notary is authorized in their country it would be accepted here, think of it same way u would if u went to another country to get married as long as its legal in the country its performed its legal in Canada

[AllisonVSC]

All a notary does is verify the identity of the person (or persons) signing the document. They are not responsible for verifying that the common law relationship exists. You are swearing to that. The notary is just the official witness. You should be fine getting it done there.