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Partner Visa: Tips for Gathering Evidence During a Long-Distance Relationship
Hi Everyone – First – what a great place – I’m very glad I found you! Secondly, sorry for the long post, though I hope you can help with some questions I have about Gathering Evidence During a Long-Distance Relationship for an Australia Partner Visa Application
Background:
I am a German citizen and my partner is Australian. We have been a couple since the end of 2018. My partner lived in Germany until late 2019. During that time, we shared experiences by living together, traveling, and meeting each other’s families. However, my partner had to return to Australia when their visa expired.
I intended to apply for a Working Holiday Visa (WHV) in 2020, but the onset of COVID-19 forced us into a long-distance relationship until Australia reopened its borders. Between April 2021 and the end of 2023, we made several trips to see each other, but since our jobs were not remote, our opportunities to visit were limited. I spent most of 2023 trying to secure a sabbatical from my job and ultimately succeeded.
In 2024, I was in Australia on a WHV for the entire year. We lived together under a sublease, began merging our finances, and made the decision for me to move to Australia permanently for the sake of our relationship. We have officially registered our relationship with the state.
As my visa was nearing its end in early 2025, I returned to Germany to sell my property, resign from my job, and prepare for our visa application, which I am currently in the process of completing. We plan to submit the onshore 820/801 partner visa application, so I will return to Australia on a tourist visa.
Question 1:
When can we officially claim a de facto relationship? We started living together in 2018 and have been treating each other as de facto partners since then. The long-distance phase from 2020 to 2023 was mainly due to COVID-19 and the complexities of our post-pandemic work situations. I am concerned about how convincingly we can present this in our application.
Question 2:
What is the best way to demonstrate communication during our long-distance relationship? Should we simply provide screen recordings of call logs, screenshots of text messages, and similar evidence? We communicate daily with around 20-30 texts, but I don’t want to inundate the authorities with excessive information. How do we select the most relevant messages from years of correspondence, and how much documentation do we need to provide?
Question 3:
What other significant evidence should we gather in the coming months before we submit our application? We have traveled together frequently in recent years, my partner has attended family events with me, and we enjoyed a holiday with my parents last year.
I am integrated into their social circle in Australia, we are drafting wills, my partner has added me to their superannuation, and we share a bank account while exploring investment opportunities together. We are also collecting witness statements from my family and friends in Australia.
Though we are not very active on social media, we have been posting more recently to support our application. What additional steps can we take to strengthen our case while maintaining a long-distance relationship?
Sorry again for the long post but thank you for any insights in advance
Grace
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