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RUSSIAN VERSION WAS RECENTLY UPDATED FOR NEW RULES THAT STARTED ON FEBRUARY 2017, PLEASE USE RUSSIAN VERSION.
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Welcome to Sponsor-Canada! Today this is the only web-site on the Internet that provide details and describe complete process of How to sponsor a spouse to Canada. I mean complete immigration process to get the spouse (wife or husband) visa to Canada via Sponsorship.
Although all materials are based on experience of Canadian embassies in Russia (Moscow) and Ukraine (Kiev) , in general it should work for all other countries as well.
Step by step. The process in two words is described in "item 2" below. Details for every step you can find in articles listed in menu on the left. Most of the information is just copy-pasted from other forums - huge thanks to those who shared their experience on several forums for sponsorship (most of forums are in Russian language).
1. Moved yourself - help others.
Authors of the web-site got the problem on their own when prepared documents to sponsor a spouse to Canada to get spouse immigration visa using spouse sponsorship process to Canada. And everybody of us when collected nuggets of information had a thought - "what if get all this together in one place". Because it is not that many things you need to know to sponsor a spouse, but on the official Canadian Immigration and Citizenship pages you can find far-far from everything you need to know. You can find the official web-site on page Official instructions, there are Russian, English and French versions.
When you are filling in Forms to sponsor a spouse your questions begin from such a simple stuff like "Do I need to write apatronimic name in Forms?" ["Patronimic name" used as a middle name and "must have" in most ex-USSR countries] and goes to very important questions - what should I answer to "Provide evidences that your marriage is genuine and continuing". What should I write about? And how many? - one page, ten or five hundred? How many would be "enough" for visa-office (embassy)?
All these and other answers you can find on our web-site. If you can't find information you need then you can ask a question from our Forum, there is English and Russian sections. Or you can ask your question on a Chemodan (Luggage) forum forum Chemodan (Russian or Ukrainian languages), authors of the web-site visit it often, as well as many other experienced people. There are discussions on many other categories of immigration, not just sponsor immigration to Canada. Many advises on this web-site have been found on the Chemodan forum.
There is no difference between to sponsor wife to Canada or to sponsor husband to Canada. So if you further see a "sponsor wife" it is same as "sponsor husband". Or better I would use words "sponsor spouse to Canada". Homosexual marriages are also accepted by Canada.
2. Whole process in two words.
- From the moment when first met your future spouse you should collect pictures and other documents as evidence of your developing relationship.
- Then you need to register your marriage, and again have a pictures and documents about this amazing event.
- Then you have to fill in Forms, collect necessary documents and make notarized copies when needed. Because this is an absolutely extremely important part of sponsorship, and the only your action to control the process - we created a "Manual: how to prepare package" to help you make it all perfect and avoid common mistakes.
- Then you create a "story", that describes and proves that your relationship is genuine, here you attache (use) pictures and documents you have prepared before.
- Next, you oredr police clearance certificate for your spouse from countries where your spouse have lived continuously six months or more (never leaving it even for half a day).
- Next, your spouse and her(his) children have to pass medical exam. Including children (under 18) who are not going to move to Canada.
- Then all this packed into single package and sent to Missisauga.
- If requested, then your spouse have to attend an interview.
- Finally, waiting for invitation to get spouse sponsorship visa to Canada.
2.а. Additionally for those who have a sponsor from QUEBEC.
Thanks to ove4ka:
If sponsor is living in Quebec then first, as everybody, fill in all forms [SC: there are some difference, see Manual], attach evidences and police+med certificates and send it to Missisauga. After your sponsor is approved you get regular mail letter that he(she) is approved and your File has been forwarded to Moscow(Kiev - depending where sponsored spouse is from), and next step for sponsor be fill in forms to acquire Quebec selection certificate for spouse as a family member of Quebec resident.
Forms are in French as far as I remember, spouse should sign it - we did it as follows: husband filled in everything, scanned and sent via e-mail to me, I have printed it, signed, scanned and sent to husband by e-mail. He collected all together and and sent. In about 2-3 weeks he got Quebec selection certtificate on my name and additional papers.
Quebec itself notifies embassy on his own way that spouse got certificate. You just need in future, when process be completed, to have the original Quebec selection certificate when you be landing in Montreal airport. My husband sent it to me via Exress-Canada Post.
And also Thanks to Shiram (this link is in Russian): http://forum.chemodan.ua/index.php?showtopic=18313&st=8440&p=531916#entry531916
Any person who is a citizen or permanent resident (same as landed immigrant) can marry and sponsor spouse to Canada, sponsor spouse immigration to Canada.
There is a recent change in this condition: if a person been sponsored on itself then this person can not sponsor anybody for five years after immigration.
After the process is completed a sponsored spouse get an immigration visa and right after entering Canada immediately become a permanent resident with all rights. A sponsor is obliged to cover spouse's expenses for food and housing during first three years after spouse entered Canada.
Примечание, для тех кто подавал заявление (получено в Миссисаге) 25 Октября 2012 года или позднее. Если муж и жена прожили непрерывно вместе меньше, чем два года и у них нет совместных детей, то при въезде в Канаду спонсируемая жена получает "условный" статус постоянного резидента на два года: если они в течении двух лет после въезда разведутся, то у жены могут анулировать статус посоянного резидента и попросить её выехать из Канады. Официальное сообщение здесь.
Spouse sponsorship to Canada is a part of bigger category - Family Class Sponsorship. Sponsoring spouses has a highest priority and got to be reviewed first of all others. Different embassies have a different processing times for the spouse sponsorship. In Moscow its about 6-8 months, in Kiev about 3-4 months. Сроки постоянно меняются - вы можете посмотреть на нашу неофициальную, но живую статистику здесь. But the situation changes and it crucially depends on how good you did your homework to prepare the documents. To help you understand the way how immigration officer is thinking we created "Manual: how to prepare sponsorship package".
There are three version of "spouse" that is accepted by Canada - oficially registered spouse (marriage), common law partner and conjugal partner. Usually you need less evidences of "relationship genuinity" in case if you are oficially married. For the Common Law there is additional required minimum length of relationship - 12 months. So you would have to prove this period. What about "conjugal" Russian version of CIC (Canada Citizenship and Immigration) web-site had a clear instruction - most likely you get rejection.
Sponsor and spouse (husband and wife) fill in Forms, acquire notarized copies of necessary documents (you can find information here), then sponsored spouse get police certificate and pass medical test, they collect evidences to prove their relationship is genuine, pay for the process and then send everything as a single package to Missisauga (Canada, Ontario) into central processing center. This center performs sponsor approval. It takes now three months (July, 2012). Processing times are changing, sometimes become smaller, sometimes bigger - you can check it on Immigration (CIC) web-site. Or you can check our informal page. Then documents are forwarded to the Canadian embassy in the country where sponsored spouse lives.
If your spouse was able to get to Canada, then you can apply to sponsor a spouse "Inside Canada". In this case the application and documents will not be forwarded to embassy (although rumors says they are forwarded anyway). Pros - spouse will live together with sponsor during the whole process. Cons - the application is reviewed by court (its my suggestion) and you can not apply for appelation (personally I doubt this is a serious cons); also the processing time become 12 months for the first part only (there will be second - 6 months to 3 years); high probability for an interview - up to 4-5 hours, a lot details, both sponsor and spouse are been questioned separately and answers compared; spouse most likely can not leave Canada till the end of process - if she travelled out and will not be able travel back then application rejected; spouse can not work, if she study then pays as international student ( 2-3 times more expensive); medical insurance - should be bought for yourself expense (this need confirmation).
Sometimes situation is different: from Forum, thanks Breeze:
From my personal experience and experience of other two girls.
Process time was from 7 to 12 months.
Interview was easy-simple, just for filling in confirmation Form. I have passed it today. The interview took about two minutes, interview questions were: are you still married, do you have children, have you been involved in crime, have you been deported, thats it. There was a croud of about 30 people – everybody been asked the same – all people were in the same room and approached officer one by one. This interview was a sort of "landing", where forms are filled in.
Nobody visited your home [SC: to verify you are really living together].
You do not need "landing" - PR-Card will be sent by mail after the interview.
The only [SC: problem] that you can apply for SIN after you will have recieved PR-Card. [SC: October, 2010]
Among answers to the message there was info about three other couples: they all were waiting about 2 years at that moment, all of them got very complicated double interview. One couple after interview were visited with inspection - are they really living together. [SC: info from 2009]
For applying for a sponsor visa for a spouse to Canada (or spouse with children) there is no formal requirements on minimum income for sponsor. But if sponsor does not work, then you need to show - what money do you have for living.
If spouse is sponsored with children and grand-children then there is a required minimum income.
Spouse can be sponsored (immigrate) with her (his) children. For children younger than 18 you must get permission from their other parent to immigrate to Canada. For children older than 22 [SC: 22 - is formal age, in reality - 18] you msut provide evidence that they are still financially dependent on immigrating spouse. Usually they are students of full-time (day-time) in some college or university. There is no maximum allowed age in official instructions, but it looks like it is 25 years old ( it means the child must be younger than 25 at the moment of submitting the documents to Missisauga).
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