Hi, good day! I am a Filipina and my boyfriend is a Permanent Resident of Canada for 2 months now. Can he sponsor me even though he is just a resident for 2 months?
Applying for Canada Conjugal Partner Sponsorship
- Thread starter Nicole Suan
- Start date
What is your immigration barrier? Have you ever lived together for over 1 year continuously? Being a resident for 2 months isn’t an issue as long as you can prove that you can support yourselves financially without government help. If he is unemployed he can update his file once employed and accumulates more savings.
We didn't live together continuously due to some circumstances, but he is coming here in the Philippines to visit. We've been in the relationship for 4 years now. Can that still be possible we can provide proofs as well if needed.
He went to Canada for a working visa and apply for PR and waited for it and finally, he got it 2 months ago. The waiting time is too long, that is why we decided to have me come to Canada first, and once I got my PR and we have enough money we will get married first in the Philippines and then in Korea.
You won't qualify for conjugal in that case. You need to get married if you want him to be able to sponsor you.
Hello, sorry for the late response. Even though one of the reasons is we have different cultures to follow when getting married since he is a Korean and I am a Filipina. His parents want to have a big wedding in Korea since he is the eldest son of the family however, we need to work on it and save money for us to get married there. Are we still not qualified for conjugal?
To be clear, to sponsor a 'spouse' there are only three ways to qualify:
-being married - that should be clear.
-being common law, which for IRCC purposes is defined as having lived together for 12 consecutive months.
-"Conjugal" is a separate category, which ONLY applies to couples who cannot get married (or become common law) due to legal and immigration barriers. The typical legal barriers are for marriages which are not allowed in other countries (eg same sex couples) or for cases of one partner not being able to get divorced in order to remarry (this is usually Phillipine nationals).
The 'immigration barrier' usually means that the non-Canadian (the applicant, not the sponsor) has been refused a visa to enter Canada - because that means the couple could not either marry in Canada or reside together in Canada to become common law.
To go back to your own case: if there is no barrier to getting married, a conjugal application will be refused. Since you plan to get married, that is clearly not the case.
If you do not qualify as common law, you will therefore have to get married to do the sponsorship.
Just to demuddy the waters as I was inconsistent: for IRCC, 'spouse' can only be through marriage or common law. (That's two ways)
"Conjugal" is a separate category / application that can only be used for those that cannot become spouses (basically).
This is NOT the normal english usage of the term conjugal and should not be confused with that.
Hello, I just want to ask if I will visit Canada can we get married while I am in Canada on a Visitor's Visa? is that possible?
Yes, and if neither have been married before, not much more than ID required. Details depend slightly on province.
But obviously the visa is the thing that's needed first.
Or get married elsewhere.
Depending on the relationship proof you have I would recommend that you avoid a just courthouse wedding. You should try to have family or friends attend even if it is a courthouse ceremony and have some sort of reception afterwards. It doesn’t have to be fancy or expensive but having a ceremony solely for immigration purposes when it would not be typical culturally always looks bad. If no family attends you should explain why. You should also take pictures of the wedding and reception with and without the guests. The fact that you got married should also be public. Some people hide the fact that they’ve had a court marriage for Immigration purposes because they are having their “real” traditional wedding in the future.