Expiring Visa - Spouse Sponsorship Question

[Sudona]

Hi there guys,

This is my current situation. I recently got married and am sponsoring my now wife from South Korea for PR. She was on a visitor visa that was extended for additional 6 months already. She has been here for a little over 11 months now and there's about a month left til her visa expiration.

I have been doing the sponsorship paper work for the past 2 weeks on my free time. Now I am concern that since the processing time takes so long, would she be able to stay in Canada during that processing period?

Should she applied for a second visitor extension? or can she apply for an open work permit right now or is it too late? I am not too sure how this works and it's a bit confusing. Any help would be appreciated.

 

[scylla]

The open work permit can only be submitted along with the inland sponsorship application. She needs to apply to extend her visit.

 

[Sudona]

So what you are saying is that, pretty much for here to stay in Canada at this point during the inland sponsorship application to process is to apply to extend her visitor visa second time right? Can you extend for a 2nd time?

 

[scylla]

Apply for the extension no matter what you do. Applications are returned if they are incomplete. If this happens to you and your wife hasn't applied to extend her status, she will find herself out of status in Canada which creates several complications.

Once you've submitted the inland PR application along with the open work permit and the application is accepted as complete, she will have implied status and will be able to remain in Canada without applying for an extension.

But again, apply for the visitor extension. Even if you were to submit the inland application now - you won't know if it's complete or not until after her visitor status has expired. Applying for the extension is like buying insurance.