Scrutiny against online relationship?

[susanmeilaa]

Hi all, I've read many wonderful posts and I thought I'd finally ask my own questions-

I met my partner online in 2015. I came here to Canada in 2016 and have been here ever since. I hail from Aussie and one thing I noticed is the majority of the applicants here did not meet online... do the officers scrutinize against couples that have met online? especially because i do not have contact with my side of family, and only his father, aunt and cousins are aware of our relationship (mother divorced and not in canada). i am afraid because my family doesnt know (as i havent spoken to them in years) and only 3 of his family members know(very small family, not many cousins, no brother or sisters) the officer would think of us as a red flag. how can we counter this and what can we do? we've lost a lot of our chat logs and we met on a game. we have a joint bank account, pictures with our friends... about to sign a common law form.. filed our tax together for 2017.. lease with both our names on it, license showing same addresses, phone mobile plans showing same addresses... and our internet in both our names, home insurance as well. he just got a new job and will add me on his insurance after 3 months, my job does not offer that (i am here legally), and he drives his father's car so im not under his insurance as its not even his car. what else should we be providing? i am scared the officer will think i am only getting in for PR purposes even though my passport is from aussie and mainly because of the families issue... any advice anybody? pls? how do we explain this?

ive tried looking into this but so far bad news- looks like some blogs and what not mention that officers DO see relationships established from online as red flags.. which is bad news..

 

[kcward7]

Hi all, I've read many wonderful posts and I thought I'd finally ask my own questions-

I met my partner online in 2015. I came here to Canada in 2016 and have been here ever since. I hail from Aussie and one thing I noticed is the majority of the applicants here did not meet online... do the officers scrutinize against couples that have met online? especially because i do not have contact with my side of family, and only his father, aunt and cousins are aware of our relationship (mother divorced and not in canada). i am afraid because my family doesnt know (as i havent spoken to them in years) and only 3 of his family members know(very small family, not many cousins, no brother or sisters) the officer would think of us as a red flag. how can we counter this and what can we do? we've lost a lot of our chat logs and we met on a game. we have a joint bank account, pictures with our friends... about to sign a common law form.. filed our tax together for 2017.. lease with both our names on it, license showing same addresses, phone mobile plans showing same addresses... and our internet in both our names, home insurance as well. he just got a new job and will add me on his insurance after 3 months, my job does not offer that (i am here legally), and he drives his father's car so im not under his insurance as its not even his car. what else should we be providing? i am scared the officer will think i am only getting in for PR purposes even though my passport is from aussie and mainly because of the families issue... any advice anybody? pls? how do we explain this?

ive tried looking into this but so far bad news- looks like some blogs and what not mention that officers DO see relationships established from online as red flags.. which is bad news..

Red flags more like online relationships when people have never met or only met a few times. It sounds like you're living together, so I wouldn't be nearly as worried.

A lot of people meet online and it's fine.

 

[firewithin6667]

Hi,

My application was approved this year, and we had met online. We applied through spousal sponsorship (married). Are you trying to do common law?

The main difference between our situations is that both my spouse's and my family were supportive. However due to costs of the flight only her side was at the wedding. It appears to not have been an issue.

For chat logs, we had met about a year and a half ago. So we had 2-3 screenshots of our conversation for every month we met about different things we'd talked about and things going on in our lives. Pictures split between all the time we shared together. I'm not sure what you can do about lost chat logs, maybe find other apps you used during that time (video chats, facebook chats, whatsapp chats, etc etc etc) and just give what you can to cover the time. If there is a gap, perhaps explain it.

For family and friends, we added letters of support with their contact info and signature.

I think you would be fine, especially that the relationship is Australian-Canadian. Filing tax together is good as well as the joint-bills. I had her name on my insurance.

I know it's not too helpful but I hope it puts you at ease a bit, I think you will be okay.

 

[susanmeilaa]

Red flags more like online relationships when people have never met or only met a few times. It sounds like you're living together, so I wouldn't be nearly as worried.

A lot of people meet online and it's fine.

so for us, we met in 2015, and to be honest my life was a mess and i was pretty down so i decided we'd give it a go, so i came here for the first time in 2016 and ... well.. it went so well that i never left (always retaining legal status).
we managed to copy and paste our chat log from Skype to a notepad, but unfortunately that meant that it's copy paste, and wont be screenshots from skype. would that do? we've been common law since 2017 as we've always lived together. the reason as to WHY we're not getting married is because we'd rather save up and have a bigger wedding than rush it, and most of our friends are just starting a new chapter in their lives, so a lot of moving about and its just not the right time yet. we've filed taxes together as well, and will get letter of support from MANY friends, just the family issue is a concern.. what should i do? - we only have ONE photo with his father, and that was when he graduated college. should we maybe gather his family (very small side) and take some christmas photos? we also have some engagement photos (engaged, but not getting married for another 2 years as we're saving money first), pictures of us doing pedicures, etc.) we also recently adopted a puppy too. not sure what else i could possibly provide.. :\

 

[susanmeilaa]

sorry.. i should add that when i applied for extension of visitor AND IEC AUS- I clearly mentioned my partner as common law as it was 2017 when i applied, and my visitor extension before that i declared intention of applying for PR and even paid 75$ fee and showed them the receipt so i think cic knows my intent and it's been set up that way for awhile now. cic will most likely see my visitor application and IEC applications when i apply as well, right? would that help at all? since ive been here 2 years now and tried to not rush things... im not sure if that helps at all..

 

[susanmeilaa]

@canuck_in_uk @scylla would you guys have any idea? many posts i see you have the best suggestions.. sorry for taking your time...

 

[monkeys89]

@canuck_in_uk @scylla would you guys have any idea? many posts i see you have the best suggestions.. sorry for taking your time...

Your relationship is considerably more established than a lot of other "online" relationships. I wouldn't worry too much about extra scrutiny solely because you met online. There have been examples on this forum of relationships where people have never met each other in person - you're in a much better position than this.

 

[susanmeilaa]

Your relationship is considerably more established than a lot of other "online" relationships. I wouldn't worry too much about extra scrutiny solely because you met online. There have been examples on this forum of relationships where people have never met each other in person - you're in a much better position than this.

never.. met in person? i had no idea that was even possible... ive lived with him for 2 years+ now, and i was worried that wasnt long enough due to family strains. never thought there had been scenarios where the couple never even met in person.. wow!

 

[np08]

Relationships that start online are never an issue in itself. It's 2018, the world is globalized and connected better than ever before. Even if you hadn't been living together, there are so many couples who meet online, maintain a long distance relationship (with visits, of course) and apply outland, having never actually lived together before. It's not an issue at all.

 

[canuck78]

Relationships that start online are never an issue in itself. It's 2018, the world is globalized and connected better than ever before. Even if you hadn't been living together, there are so many couples who meet online, maintain a long distance relationship (with visits, of course) and apply outland, having never actually lived together before. It's not an issue at all.

Yes but unfortunately many people plan to either get married on a first visit or after very brief visits. There are also people on the internet trying to find a Canadian spouse and sometimes partners are too trusting/blinded by love so IRCC has to be on the look out for warning signs. There is also a large number of individuals who have arranged marriages who hold Canadian citizenship or PR. Some have had no contact with their future spouse before their engagement and marriage on the same trip. You actually have more proof than most spousal/common law sponsorships. Some of the people with the most proof actually worry the most

 

[susanmeilaa]

Yes but unfortunately many people plan to either get married on a first visit or after very brief visits. There are also people on the internet trying to find a Canadian spouse and sometimes partners are too trusting/blinded by love so IRCC has to be on the look out for warning signs. There is also a large number of individuals who have arranged marriages who hold Canadian citizenship or PR. Some have had no contact with their future spouse before their engagement and marriage on the same trip. You actually have more proof than most spousal/common law sponsorships. Some of the people with the most proof actually worry the most

wow thats surprising! for us we dont want to rush marriage as it's a one in a life time experience, and it's not right to do it without every loved one coming. so the fact that I have NO contact with my side of family (nor any plans to ever sponsor them) and that only 3-4 people of his family knows (small family, no interaction with his family in china) is not a major red flag? i know it all boils down to how genuine the relationship is, but i feel that officers would scrutinize against us due to the family situation. that was my main and biggest concern. :\ would letters of support and some photos help?

 

[np08]

Yes but unfortunately many people plan to either get married on a first visit or after very brief visits. There are also people on the internet trying to find a Canadian spouse and sometimes partners are too trusting/blinded by love so IRCC has to be on the look out for warning signs. There is also a large number of individuals who have arranged marriages who hold Canadian citizenship or PR. Some have had no contact with their future spouse before their engagement and marriage on the same trip. You actually have more proof than most spousal/common law sponsorships. Some of the people with the most proof actually worry the most

Ah, yes. My relationship started as an online one and I surprisingly know more than one other couple who succeeded longterm to the point of closing the distance and getting married (all of these were not just some small distance, but different continents type of distance). Coupled with the fact that I used to be a regular visitor at r/longdistance, I'm very used to the idea of genuine long distance relationships that started online.

I've definitely seen a couple of cases on here of people asking if they should marry during their first or second visit in a relationship that's under one year which is, yeah, that's a red flag for sure.

But in the case of OP, with their story and all, it really seems they were only worried about the fact that their relationship started online, disregarding the very obviously genuine nature of their relationship and all the proof they have.

In this day and age, people working for immigration are definitely familiar with the concept. My first time ever visiting my then gf, I landed at Pearson in Toronto, with a brand new passport having never before traveled outside of Europe. I was naturally pulled aside and asked for the purpose of my visit and, even though I was really scared, I said honestly that I was visiting my gf. The officer asked me how we'd met and I said online. She asked if this was our first time meeting and I said yes. She deliberated for a couple of seconds and let me through, wishing me a nice stay in Canada. I'm sure that the fact I was enrolled at a university and coming from the EU helped, but it was definitely nice that she didn't seem fazed one bit by the fact that I met my gf online a year prior and was coming all that way just to meet her in person for the first time.

Times have changed, for sure.

 

[canuck_in_uk]

@canuck_in_uk @scylla would you guys have any idea? many posts i see you have the best suggestions.. sorry for taking your time...

Stop worrying. You don't have red flags. The family thing is not an issue; lots of people do not have contact with their family.

 

[keesio]

so the fact that I have NO contact with my side of family (nor any plans to ever sponsor them) and that only 3-4 people of his family knows (small family, no interaction with his family in china) is not a major red flag? i know it all boils down to how genuine the relationship is, but i feel that officers would scrutinize against us due to the family situation. that was my main and biggest concern. :\ would letters of support and some photos help?

You don't have any major red flag.

Meeting initially online itself is a non-issue since you have a strong history of living together. No problems there at all.

Maybe, maybe the lack of family interaction is a tiny red flag but it is very minor and easily offset by your strong history together. Nothing to be really concerned about.