Spousal Sponsorship Errors

The most common reason an Immigration Officer may call your application into question is when you claim a religious affiliation when you’re not religious. Leaving out a photo of a particular religious ritual could be all that is needed to get a refusal of your application. IRCC only wants you to submit 20 photos to prove your marriage. The Immigration Officer will expect to see at least one photo of the person officiating the wedding. Remember now you only have 18 other photos to convince him/her that the marriage is genuine and continuing.

If you are not religious don’t state that you are just because your grandparents always attended a temple, church, mosque, or a synagogue. If your partner is of a different religion, questions will be asked if they converted. If both of you are not religious consider having your wedding anywhere other than in a temple, church, mosque, or a synagogue.  

Don’t be overconfident just because both of you know that you love one another. Take your time to explain any differences the two of you may have by focusing on the things that brought the two of you together.

·         In 2019 there were 2,746 sponsorship appeals filed with only 1,552 being accepted.

·         In 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic there were 1,244 sponsorship appeals filed.

·         In January and February of 2021 there were 239 filed or 119 per month.

If one scrolls down and looks at the 2018 numbers, they will see the numbers are almost identical to the 2019 numbers. The key is that does not reflect the number of spousal applications that get refused because these numbers are only the sponsorship appeals filed.   

https://irb.gc.ca/en/statistics/immigration-appeals/Pages/index.aspx