Proof of residency obligations: Visa check in and check out stamps at Airport

[jerry_25]

I was not very sure if Visa check in and check out stamps are enough proof of your stay period in Canada. One can get job letter's etc but what if someone has worked lets say 50% time and rest of the 50% period is unemployed(just as an example).
So basically Visa entry and exit stamps at Canadian Airport can be sufficient proof of number of days of your stay. Pls suggest on this

 

[Leon]

You can get exit stamps at Canadian airports? I have never gotten an exit stamp.

There are various things you can use to prove your stay in Canada if you have to. One is job letter and if you were unemployed and on EI, you should have records of that as well. Of course your tax returns as well. You can also ask your dentist to verify when you have had appointments there and you can ask the health care to give you a list of all your visits that were covered by them. You can get records from your bank for your bank account activity, ATM card and visa card. You can get phone bills and utility bills as well as rent receipts.

 

[jerry_25]

thanks for reply, I am also not sure about exit stamp but ofcourse you get stamped on arrival at your home country :
fine you can collect whatever you have suggested but is not more concrete is your Visa stamps which pin points to exact number of days. However not very sure whether your your entry by road from USA, whether your passport is mandatory stamped?
In my opinion this is the only exact proof, others can be supporting docs., but one can stand and say very definite only by entry dates and leaving dates, that should be enough proof why you need all other clutter of docs

 

[Leon]

My home country doesn't stamp my passport on arrival so that is not a 100% proof. You can say that your country does but as far as I have heard, in some countries you can also pay immigration to put a different date stamp on your passport if you want. You may also use the trick of getting no stamp in your home country, then entering a 3rd country after a long stay in your home country and telling immigration Canada that this is your entry stamp from leaving Canada. You should definitely try to keep other proof as well in case you are at some point asked to provide it.

 

[meyakanor]

Does Canada record every entry without missing (I know that sometimes they won't give you stamps on your passport, but every time you enter, it should have been recorded on the system, right?)? If they do, then wouldn't an event that requires your presence to happen (such as a doctor visit, a conference talk, a thesis defense, for example) be a definite proof of continuous stay from the date of said event all the way to the last time your entry was recorded, even if it was a one-off event?

For example, if the LAST time you entered Canada on, say, January 1 2013, and on, say, April 10 2013, you visited a doctor (that would require you to swipe your health card), wouldn't it necessarily mean that from January 1 2013 to April 10 2013 you are continuously present in Canada? If you have left in between, for you to be able to swipe your card on April 10, you would've had to enter Canada, and this entry would have been recorded; so if there was no entry between January 1 and April 10 (the time where you swiped your health card, for example), wouldn't it mean you reside continuously this whole time in Canada?

 

[Leon]

Your exits may not be recorded but your entries should be. If you had entered in January and you have medical records and bank records in April, immigration will probably assume that you were in Canada at least from January 'til April. However, if they don't believe you for some reason, they may insist that another person could have used your cards. That is unless maybe your health card has a photo on it. Say you had a cunning plan to leave a foot print in Canada without being there, you would open a bank account in your name and give it to a relative in Canada to play with and you would give your health card to a relative and they go to the GP every couple of months with a back ache or a sore throat and voila, you would have records supporting you being in Canada when you weren't.

 

[meyakanor]

Your exits may not be recorded but your entries should be. If you had entered in January and you have medical records and bank records in April, immigration will probably assume that you were in Canada at least from January 'til April. However, if they don't believe you for some reason, they may insist that another person could have used your cards. That is unless maybe your health card has a photo on it. Say you had a cunning plan to leave a foot print in Canada without being there, you would open a bank account in your name and give it to a relative in Canada to play with and you would give your health card to a relative and they go to the GP every couple of months with a back ache or a sore throat and voila, you would have records supporting you being in Canada when you weren't.

I never had the chance to use my health card yet, since I only got it on October last year, but I'm assuming they will check your identity before you can use it, right? So if you swipe your health card, the person using the card would have to be you. Unless, of course, if you have an identical twin, or if you somehow sneak in without getting noticed by the border agent (maybe if you gain a visa-exempt citizenship after becoming a PR, and then change your name, so your second passport has a different name).

But I think those scenarios really would be a stretch (where people use a second visa-exempt passport with a different name, identical twins who are both PRs, etc), and I think in most cases, even one-off events (if it definitely requires your presence) would be enough proof for continuous residency, at least up to the last time your entry was recorded. I understand that bank records, cell phone and utility bills, or even lease agreements won't be enough, but using health card should be strong enough proof of residency (at least, Ontario and BC have health cards with photo ID's, not sure about other provinces).


EDIT: I just noticed that most provinces and territories don't even have photos on their health cards. What a bummer

 

[Leon]

I never had the chance to use my health card yet, since I only got it on October last year, but I'm assuming they will check your identity before you can use it, right? So if you swipe your health card, the person using the card would have to be you. Unless, of course, if you have an identical twin, or if you somehow sneak in without getting noticed by the border agent (maybe if you gain a visa-exempt citizenship after becoming a PR, and then change your name, so your second passport has a different name).

I don't think this is common but could happen. I recently heard someone say that every time he goes back to Canada after a long stay outside, he stops by in a 3rd country to get a passport stamp. Therefore, his passport will have a 3rd country stamp and a few days later an entry stamp in Canada. It looks like he has only visited the 3rd country for a few days and otherwise been in Canada the whole time.

Many provinces have simple paper cards with a name and health care number on them. If you show up at the doctors with a health card and no ID, I don't think they will turn you away so you would not even have to look like the person whose card it is. I remember a case not too long ago where a woman was denied renewal of her PR card because immigration did not believe she was in Canada. They did not revoke her PR because they didn't have proof that she wasn't but they didn't believe that she was either. They claimed that she had somebody else use her bank account and credit cards. I do not think she had a health care statement though.

In any case, if you need to show evidence of having been in Canada, having had a full time regular job would be the best because you would have pay slips and tax records but if you don't have that, you have to submit that you have and hope that they will believe you.