I-130 evidence for bona fide marriage (Canada)

[daigo1 2]

My wife (residing in Quebec) plans to apply for the CR-1 visa so I recently filed the I-130 petition online via myUSCIS and they sent a Receipt Notice document to my account the same day.

Since this is the first time she is applying for a visa and my first time petitioning for anyone, I was under the impression that if I just follow the directions, it's a pretty straightfoward process, but reading some stories on this forum after the fact about couples that have been married for over a decade with children and still receiving RFEs for bona fide marriage when they sent their I-130, I'm a little concerned that we haven't sent enough evidence now.

We have been married for under a year (both of us aged in our late 20s) and still live apart obviously, so the only things we really have are photos. We both WFH so we're mostly on video calls with each other ~12+ hours every day so I'm not sure how to send evidence of that since we don't usually chat or exchange text correspondence and just talk over video. We visit each other infrequently for a few days at a time since we both don't have a high income (I make ~$50k USD/year gross and her around $55k CAD/year gross) and have limited PTO from our jobs, but on occasion she will drive down here over the weekend to surprise me (~6 hour drive one-way). I mostly uploaded our wedding photos and photos of some activities we did while together in person, along with invoices from the jeweler for both our wedding rings showing that we split the billing cost (in the thousands of USD) between us, so I'm not sure what else I can provide in the event where I receive an RFE.

[KMG 108]

1 hour ago, daigo1 said:

My wife (residing in Quebec) plans to apply for the CR-1 visa so I recently filed the I-130 petition online via myUSCIS and they sent a Receipt Notice document to my account the same day.

Since this is the first time she is applying for a visa and my first time petitioning for anyone, I was under the impression that if I just follow the directions, it's a pretty straightfoward process, but reading some stories on this forum after the fact about couples that have been married for over a decade with children and still receiving RFEs for bona fide marriage when they sent their I-130, I'm a little concerned that we haven't sent enough evidence now.

We have been married for under a year (both of us aged in our late 20s) and still live apart obviously, so the only things we really have are photos. We both WFH so we're mostly on video calls with each other ~12+ hours every day so I'm not sure how to send evidence of that since we don't usually chat or exchange text correspondence and just talk over video. We visit each other infrequently for a few days at a time since we both don't have a high income (I make ~$50k USD/year gross and her around $55k CAD/year gross) and have limited PTO from our jobs, but on occasion she will drive down here over the weekend to surprise me (~6 hour drive one-way). I mostly uploaded our wedding photos and photos of some activities we did while together in person, along with invoices from the jeweler for both our wedding rings showing that we split the billing cost (in the thousands of USD) between us, so I'm not sure what else I can provide in the event where I receive an RFE.

Write a Will with her as the beneficiary, include travel documents such as boarding passes, reservations, etc.  Sometimes you have to think creatively!  Also sometimes people get RFE's because they need a marriage certificate submitted in a different form,  something they do not realize is an issue when submitting paperwork.  Some of these RFE's are coming from high fraud countries and USCIS is really trying to comb through evidence of marriage.

[daigo1 2]

14 minutes ago, KMG said:

Write a Will with her as the beneficiary, include travel documents such as boarding passes, reservations, etc.  Sometimes you have to think creatively!  Also sometimes people get RFE's because they need a marriage certificate submitted in a different form,  something they do not realize is an issue when submitting paperwork.  Some of these RFE's are coming from high fraud countries and USCIS is really trying to comb through evidence of marriage.

 

Any ideas other than the will? I'm not sure how to come up with travel documents if we drive to each other and we stay at each others' apartments whenever we visit. We are willing to record and submit videos detailing how we spend each day together via webcam but they do not accept video formats nor do I think they have the time to comb through thousands of hours worth of footage of just us talking about nonsense all day.

[apond 33]

My wife is Canadian and I am a UsC. We used to meet every few weeks at a border town for a weekend.  In between our days were much like yours as we spent them on video chat nearly 20 hours a day on days I didn’t work.  So for us the meeting every few weeks at a border town ( 7 hours for me 6 for her to drive to meet) was important. It allowed us more time together in the real world plus lots of evidence of a relationship.  The more time together the better and we had pics in various locations together plus the border crossings. Aside from all that we made each other beneficiary for life insurance, I added her to my lease and as an authorized user on my CC and added her to my bank account.  All before she was here and had a SSN. 

[daigo1 2]

9 minutes ago, apond said:

My wife is Canadian and I am a UsC. We used to meet every few weeks at a border town for a weekend.  In between our days were much like yours as we spent them on video chat nearly 20 hours a day on days I didn’t work.  So for us the meeting every few weeks at a border town ( 7 hours for me 6 for her to drive to meet) was important. It allowed us more time together in the real world plus lots of evidence of a relationship.  The more time together the better and we had pics in various locations together plus the border crossings. Aside from all that we made each other beneficiary for life insurance, I added her to my lease and as an authorized user on my CC and added her to my bank account.  All before she was here and had a SSN. 

Did you use a national bank and if so, which one? I'm with a local credit union and they won't allow me to add my wife so I'm willing to change banks if there is a more foreign-friendly one

[apond 33]

26 minutes ago, daigo1 said:

Did you use a national bank and if so, which one? I'm with a local credit union and they won't allow me to add my wife so I'm willing to change banks if there is a more foreign-friendly one

 Yep I used TD then and still do now. They had no issues adding her.  

[SansTortoise 20]

10 hours ago, daigo1 said:

 

Any ideas other than the will? I'm not sure how to come up with travel documents if we drive to each other and we stay at each others' apartments whenever we visit. We are willing to record and submit videos detailing how we spend each day together via webcam but they do not accept video formats nor do I think they have the time to comb through thousands of hours worth of footage of just us talking about nonsense all day.

She can pull the log of every entry and exit from the U.S. on her passport from CBPs website. That’ll give you coverage from her end.

You’d need to send in a FOIA request to CBP for the equivalent on your U.S. passport. Probably worth doing in case you get an RFE, but I wouldn’t wait 10 months for their response.

[Lemonslice 4,798]

13 hours ago, daigo1 said:

My wife (residing in Quebec) plans to apply for the CR-1 visa so I recently filed the I-130 petition online via myUSCIS and they sent a Receipt Notice document to my account the same day.

Since this is the first time she is applying for a visa and my first time petitioning for anyone, I was under the impression that if I just follow the directions, it's a pretty straightfoward process, but reading some stories on this forum after the fact about couples that have been married for over a decade with children and still receiving RFEs for bona fide marriage when they sent their I-130, I'm a little concerned that we haven't sent enough evidence now.

We have been married for under a year (both of us aged in our late 20s) and still live apart obviously, so the only things we really have are photos. We both WFH so we're mostly on video calls with each other ~12+ hours every day so I'm not sure how to send evidence of that since we don't usually chat or exchange text correspondence and just talk over video. We visit each other infrequently for a few days at a time since we both don't have a high income (I make ~$50k USD/year gross and her around $55k CAD/year gross) and have limited PTO from our jobs, but on occasion she will drive down here over the weekend to surprise me (~6 hour drive one-way). I mostly uploaded our wedding photos and photos of some activities we did while together in person, along with invoices from the jeweler for both our wedding rings showing that we split the billing cost (in the thousands of USD) between us, so I'm not sure what else I can provide in the event where I receive an RFE.

Your wife can also add you as a beneficiary on her insurance/banking/investment accounts.  Employer's spouse benefits, if they offer any.  My American spouse had also added me to his + his health insurance; we had opened a joint account during one of my visit; bought a house, so we had some papers from that also.  We brought those to our interview, however no evidence of our relationship was asked - which we did not mind since they were still great things to do as a married couple. 

 

I am not saying the ring is meaningless, but it is one purchase; being beneficiaries on each other's accounts, commingling as much as feasible while still living apart, seeing each other as often as possible, those things do add up to demonstrate you have a bonafide marriage.  Don't stress too much about it, it is normal to not have everything "joint" when living separately, but from my experience, it does facilitate the move to have at least some.  

 

Your spouse might also be interested in some topics in the Canada subforum (EI after immigrating, importing goods, etc.).  

[daigo1 2]

8 hours ago, SansTortoise said:

She can pull the log of every entry and exit from the U.S. on her passport from CBPs website. That’ll give you coverage from her end.

You’d need to send in a FOIA request to CBP for the equivalent on your U.S. passport. Probably worth doing in case you get an RFE, but I wouldn’t wait 10 months for their response.

 

Oh, thank you. Didn't know that was a thing; I will look into it.

 

Actually, we were both considering moving finding respective apartments closer to the Quebec/upstate NY/Vermont border just so that we could just see each other every day in person if we're only like 1-hour drive from each other and then we could take a montage of photos every day like a daily time lapse for our photo album but it would also probably make a strong case for the immigration papers if we're seeing each other in person every single day as well.

 

7 hours ago, Lemonslice said:

Your wife can also add you as a beneficiary on her insurance/banking/investment accounts.  Employer's spouse benefits, if they offer any.  My American spouse had also added me to his + his health insurance; we had opened a joint account during one of my visit; bought a house, so we had some papers from that also.  We brought those to our interview, however no evidence of our relationship was asked - which we did not mind since they were still great things to do as a married couple. 

 

I am not saying the ring is meaningless, but it is one purchase; being beneficiaries on each other's accounts, commingling as much as feasible while still living apart, seeing each other as often as possible, those things do add up to demonstrate you have a bonafide marriage.  Don't stress too much about it, it is normal to not have everything "joint" when living separately, but from my experience, it does facilitate the move to have at least some.  

 

Your spouse might also be interested in some topics in the Canada subforum (EI after immigrating, importing goods, etc.).  

 

My wife has TD Bank so as suggested by a previous poster, she's looking into adding me to her bank account which seems like good news. Neither of our employers offers benefits and I don't have health insurance because it's too expensive. I guess I might as well relocate closer to her and get a new job that offers benefits while I'm at it. I think it might be an idea to look into a cheap house we can both purchase as a placeholder home so that at least we can both have our names on the deed/title (we have an idea of our dream home but it will take like 10+ years to save up for the down payment at our current incomes). Thank you for the suggestions. Just feels really annoying to jump through all these hoops just because we were born in different countries

[SansTortoise 20]

1 minute ago, daigo1 said:

 

Oh, thank you. Didn't know that was a thing; I will look into it.

Link to CBP’s I-94 website: https://i94.cbp.dhs.gov/I94/#/home

[Lemonslice 4,798]

8 hours ago, daigo1 said:

 

Oh, thank you. Didn't know that was a thing; I will look into it.

 

Actually, we were both considering moving finding respective apartments closer to the Quebec/upstate NY/Vermont border just so that we could just see each other every day in person if we're only like 1-hour drive from each other and then we could take a montage of photos every day like a daily time lapse for our photo album but it would also probably make a strong case for the immigration papers if we're seeing each other in person every single day as well.

 

 

My wife has TD Bank so as suggested by a previous poster, she's looking into adding me to her bank account which seems like good news. Neither of our employers offers benefits and I don't have health insurance because it's too expensive. I guess I might as well relocate closer to her and get a new job that offers benefits while I'm at it. I think it might be an idea to look into a cheap house we can both purchase as a placeholder home so that at least we can both have our names on the deed/title (we have an idea of our dream home but it will take like 10+ years to save up for the down payment at our current incomes). Thank you for the suggestions. Just feels really annoying to jump through all these hoops just because we were born in different countries

I think there's state sponsored health insurance in Vermont, you might look into that.  She's going to lose her Québec health care as soon as she immigrates, make sure it's clear if you don't think you'll be able to afford her coverage in the US when she moves. 

 

 

 

 

[daigo1 2]

14 hours ago, Lemonslice said:

I think there's state sponsored health insurance in Vermont, you might look into that.  She's going to lose her Québec health care as soon as she immigrates, make sure it's clear if you don't think you'll be able to afford her coverage in the US when she moves. 

 

 

 

 

Thank you. Yes, we're aware but the plan was that once we combine our finances, and I get out of NYC, we will be able to afford health insurance since we'll be living together with cheaper rent, utility bills, food, etc. and whatnot since everything will be cheaper combined.

[Ellie_Chiheb 1]

On 8/21/2024 at 3:02 PM, daigo1 said:

Did you use a national bank and if so, which one? I'm with a local credit union and they won't allow me to add my wife so I'm willing to change banks if there is a more foreign-friendly one

Citizens bank will do it to. They just have to sign. Which she can do during a visit.