What evidence do I need for a New Zealand partnership visa?

INZ defines partnership as 2 people who live together in a genuine and stable relationship in a legal marriage, a civil union or a de facto relationship. You and your partner must be aged 18 or older, not be close relatives, and have met each other before applying for a visa based on your partnership.

Your evidence must be from after you and your partner turned 18. INZ says that if you include evidence from before you both turned 18, it will not use it to assess your relationship.

INZ says living together means sharing the same home as your partner. It does not include:

• spending time in each other's homes while you each maintain your own home
• sharing accommodation while on holiday
• living as flatmates in the same house.

Evidence of living together can include joint ownership of, or a home loan for, residential property; a joint rental agreement or rental receipts; joint utility accounts, like power or phone bills; and joint or individual mail sent to your shared address.

INZ says you can provide items showing your shared address, dated every few months, to cover the full duration. They can be addressed to you jointly or individually, as long as INZ can see you have both been at the same address for the same period of time.

For some applications, such as a Partner of a New Zealander Resident Visa, INZ says evidence of living together must cover a period of 12 months before the application is submitted.

INZ says the evidence needs to show that:

• others recognise your relationship
• you make decisions and plans together
• you spend leisure time together
• you parent together, if you have children.

The evidence INZ lists includes marriage or civil union certificates, birth certificates for any children you share, joint bank accounts being used frequently, joint ownership of assets, joint credit cards or hire purchase agreements, mutually agreed financial arrangements, cards, letters or emails sent to you both, chat records between you, social media posts or photos of you together, and letters of support that recognise your partnership.

INZ says it considers things like:

• how long you have been together
• how committed you are to a life together
• any children you have together, including your arrangements for their care
• whether other people recognise your relationship
• how long you have been living together, your living arrangements, and whether you share household tasks
• whether you support each other financially, how you share financial responsibilities, and whether you own or share property

INZ says that if you have spent time living apart, you should explain the reasons, how long you were apart, and how you kept in touch. It uses this to assess whether you had genuine and compelling reasons to stay apart.

INZ says that online applications accept scanned images, so you do not need originals or certified copies. For a paper residence application, it must receive originals or certified copies, and electronically issued documents count as originals. For a Partner of a New Zealander Resident Visa, INZ publishes a partnership timeline and evidence checklist you can include with the application.