income on commom law spouse application

[wdcoates]

CONTEXT---COMMON LAW, PERM RES AND INCOME: I'm sponsoring my partner for permanent residence through the spousal sponsorship program (no children or dependents are involved). We sent in an application (inland), and it was returned on the basis of lacking supporting documentation, we assume, with the following application text parts being highlighted/underlined as reason for the refusal (no notes of specification provided; see PART A, Section 5): "Employment/Sources of Support" and "also submit your recent Notice of Assessment [taxes]" and "if you cannot provide a Notice of Assessment, or an equivalent document, for the most recent taxation year, provide an explanation on a separate sheet of paper". I am currently unemployed (a Canadian sponsor), but my common law partner is fully employed. And although I did detail all of my recent work on our application, I did not specify (and instead only implied, by not saying anything about what I was doing now) that I was not currently working/employed. However, I also did NOT include any "Notice of Assessment" (cited above) in my application either...my understanding was that they could not refuse an application in this stream for reasons of unemployment, and that having not been employed in a while, the "Notice" would provided them with nothing of significance in terms of information about me.

We've since applied a second time (this time outland, because we'd heard it was faster), only this time we've included my recent "Notice of Assessment" with the application. My questions are as follows:

QUESTION 1: Can a common law sponsorship/application be refused on the grounds that the sponsor is unemployed (even if, for example, the principal applicant is gainfully employed)? Is refusal and acceptance of an application on these grounds considered discretionary (that is, at the discretion of the immigration processing agent)?

QUESTION 2: Was our application (detailed above) refused because we did not prove a "Notice of Assessment" with our application---implying that it was NOT my unemployment that played a deciding factor in the refusal of my application---or have we been refused because I am currently unemployed; OR perhaps as a third option, because I should have included a "Notice", AS WELL AS a clear and direct (rather than implied) statement that I am currently unemployed, with the application?

 

[Helena R]

Hi there,

I just saw your post.

So... When they returned your package, what exactly said on their letter ? That you r package didn´t meet the requirements to be processed ? Or you were notifies that you were ineligible as as sponsor ?

If you didn´t submit your Notice of Assesment and didn´t include a letter explaining why, you package would surely be returned. But it doesn´t necessarily mean that you are not eligible to be a sponsor if it doesn´t say so.

Question 1: Usually, the income of the sponsor will not affect your eligibility. If your income is low, you can still sponsor someone. What you have to explain is how you support yourself if you are unemployed. I don´t think it is at their discretion about this subject, they follow the rules here. Even though she works, the application depends on you as a sponsor, so her income here does not count. They need to see that either you or her will not need to ask for socail assistance because you can provide for both.

Question 2: Again, what did their letter said ? Your package being returned does not mean you r application is refused. They are two completely different things.