Anneen J

Completely unacceptable service - No delivery 13 weeks after payment

Completed all documents for applications for our unabridged marriage certificate and made full payment immediately, on 27 January 2026. Was told we will have our certificate within no longer than 3 weeks. After a few weeks (long past the 3 week mark) I followed up and Tanya said there is a problem due to there being two applications logged - I informed her we have never app**** before, so it wasn't us. Another few weeks passed and I followed up again, same story. So I phoned home affairs and they stated that there is no application on the system. I informed Tanya of this and she then I formed me that home affairs can't locate the register in which our marriage is recorded and therefore can't issue the certificate. I luckily stumbled upon a copy of the register with our ANC and shared that with Tanya, she said that she will now be able to get our certificate. That was about two weeks ago. I followed up last week, she said her correspondent who assist her will be ba k from leave yesterday. Today she informed me that the office who usually assist them is under investigation, our certificate have not been issued and she can't tell us when the "new office" will be able to issue it. Note that six weeks after initially applying, Dean promised my husband we will definitely have our certificate that weekend - and nothing. It is now almost 13 weeks, Immigration Assist is sitting with our money, and we have no certificate and no indication when we will get it. When enquiring with Home Affairs, we were told they can issue it to us within 6 weeks. We told Immigration Assist to refund us, and she stated they won't. We will be approaching the police as this is theft - we paid for a service and we didn't receive it. So I can't add a comment and will add here - we contacted the police for process and was informed it is a civil case. Tanya from Immigration Assist sent another email stating they won't refund us. We were patient for 13 weeks, even understanding at times, but the way we got treated is appalling, we were clearly not valued clients - our money was good enough and that is where the "good" ended. We will be applying for our UMC directly at home affairs ourselves. If I had to give someone my opinion - DO NOT do it. The hassle of quing at Home Affairs and waiting for issue of certificates, is much better than being treated like this by a company who asks thousands for their services and promises fast turn around times, but then don't even answer or return calls. If we went to home affairs directly, we would have had our certificate by now. Heartbreaking and disappointing service from Immigration Assist 💔