Issue with Conjugal Partner category

[relocate_to_Canada]

I am an American citizen and my girlfriend is Canadian. Recently we submitted application under Family class - Conjugal Partner. We selected this category because: a) we cannot live 1 year together in Canada or USA as each of us can spend only 6 months in the other country; b) we are not officially married, and were thinking to keep things this way, but our relationship is more than 5 years old, and we thought we sent plenty of proof for it. Now, I got letter from Canadian Immigration saying that they are not satisfied that we have proven that we have a conjugal relationship for at least one year etc, and they are asking for more proof.
Reading through the forum, I think that we might have selected wrong category and should have rather married and used Spouse category. We will submit more proof, but we might be rejected again under the Conjugal Relationship category. We can marry officially and submit that as additional proof, but we are afraid this will change our category to 'Spouse' and we will have to submit new application, and lose more time and fees payed for a new application.
What would be your advice, will a new marriage certificate be helpful or it will automatically invalidate our current application and we will need to submit a new one under the new category?

 

[MilesAway]

Applying under conjugal was a mistake. Americans do not qualify for this category as there are no legal barriers to marriage, and an American can easily extend their stay to reach the 12 months required for common-law.

Your best bet is probably to get married and submit the marriage certificate. They may or may not change your application to spouse. You might have to reapply under the correct category.

 

[scylla]

Agreed with the advice above. You don't meet the requirements for conjugal since it's very easy for you to either live together to become common law or get married. Unfortunately it was a mistake to apply this way.

I would get married asap and submit this evidence and request your application to be considered as a married couple. It might work or it might not - impossible for any of us to say for sure. Worst case scenario, it is possible you're going to be refused and will have to reapply from scratch.

Good luck.

 

[canadianwoman]

I agree with the above posters. You will be refused with a conjugal application. I would suggest you get married and send in proof of this. There have been cases where the visa officer has considered the applicant under the 'spouse' category after doing this.

If it does not work, well, it is almost certain that the conjugal application won't be accepted anyway, so trying will not hurt.

 

[relocate_to_Canada]

Thank you so much for sharing your advice, much appreciated and helpful!