Parental Sponsorship Reopens January 2014

Canada Reopened Parental Sponsorship in January 2014

Great news! If you want to sponsor your parents or grandparents, the wait is finally over. After a 2 year wait, you can finally sponsor your parents and grandparents. This route has reopened as of January 2, 2014 and will only accept 5,000 applications. Meaning, getting your documents in order as soon as possible and filing your application immediately is critical. The demand for this application is extremely high. It is estimated that about 60,000 applicants will file a Parental Sponsorship Application. As mentioned, only 5,000 will be accepted. It will be on a first come first serve basis.

Just filing an application will not be good enough. Ensuring that you file a strong application with all the necessary documents is very important. If you file an incomplete application, your application will be returned to you and you may lose your change to be one of the 5,000 applicants.

The sponsor of relatives hoping to immigrate to Canada must now meet new criteria to be eligible to apply, including:

• There has been an increase of 30 percent for the minimum income requirement. So it is very important to ensure that you meet the minimum income requirements when you decide to sponsor your family member. If you do not, your application will be returned as incomplete or possibly even refused.
• Another key change is demonstrating that you meet the minimum income requirement for the last 3 years as opposed to the 1 year requirements before.
• The Financial Undertaking has also increased from the former 10 year period to 20 years.

The government promises faster processing times. The government promises a processing of less than 2 years. If you would like to reunite with your family sooner, you may be eligible to apply for a Super Visa Application.

A Super Visa is a 10 year temporary visa for parents and grandparents. You can apply for Parental Sponsorship as well as the Super Visa at the same time.

Please call us today so that we can start reunite you with your family members!