Contents of an Invitation Letter for a Tourist/Visitor Visa

When your family or friends are applying for a visa to visit Canada, they may ask you to provide an invitation letter to support and strengthen their visitor visa application. If you provide an invitation letter for inviting another to visit Canada it does not make you legally responsible for that person while they are in Canada. However, everything stated in the invitation letter must be stated truthfully and in good faith.

There is no specific template/format in which an invitation letter should be drafted. Nevertheless, it should contain the following information:

• Information about the person you are inviting:

Full name, date of birth, address and telephone number, your relationship with them, the purpose of the trip, how long they plan to stay in Canada, where they will stay, how will they take care of their expenses while in Canada, as well as when they plan to leave Canada.

• Information about yourself:

Full name, date of birth, address and telephone number in Canada, job title, whether you are a Canadian citizen or permanent resident, a photocopy of a document proving your status in Canada, details of your family and the total number of people living in your household.

In addition, always keep in mind that the purpose of your friend’s and family’s travel to Canada should at least be a few months away to account for the delays in grant of a visa. For example, if you plan to have your family over for a wedding in December and you’re sending the invitation letter in October / November, the visa officer may reject your family’s visa given the fact that by the time they review your family’s visa application, the wedding would have been held already.

It is also best to get your invitation letter notarized before sending it to the person you are inviting to Canada as some visa offices may later ask for a notarized copy and this may delay the application of the person you are inviting.

If you need any help in drafting an invitation letter or getting it notarized, contact our experienced immigration lawyers at 604-993-0994.