Hi Everyone.
I have been looking on this site for advise and questions/answers regarding myself and my partners up coming options.
We meet in Canada while I was on my OE and we lived together for about 1 month and 10ish days. We moved in together as we wanted to be closer to each other and the usual partner reasons.
My Working Holiday Visa came to end and had to leave Canada and we said our goodbyes knowing she would come to NZ to live after finishing her studies. Which is in May 2014 (this year)
During our time apart we remain as partners and Skype, Facebook etc regularly (our Facebook message history is 700 pages long)
When she arrives she will be on her Working Holiday Visa which is valid for a year when she first arrives in NZ. She will live with me at the same address. We will change accounts and bills into shared names and open an account to pay rent and bills into so when it comes to the application its all there going into one account and out of the same account to bills etc.
Anyway, my main question is this.
We will apply for the Partners Visa while she is in New Zealand, at the time of application we will have 12 months of living together. However she will have probably about 1 month and a little bit longer while they process the visa. Can a processing visa be given to her so she doesn't have to leave NZ if they have not made a decision by the 1 month mark. According to the INZ website processing takes around 25 days and visas can be issued while processing is taking place but is a case by case. What were the processing times for others in the fourm some say 2 weeks other say 2 months. Do applications from within NZ with both applicants in the country at the time of application get priority so processing times could be say 2 - 3 weeks?