Refusal statistics are not published, which leaves couples preparing an application guessing at which part of the file is most fragile. Practitioners handling these cases see the same weak points recur, and most of them are fixable before filing rather than after a rejection lands.
IND doesn't publish refusal statistics, but immigration lawyers who handle these cases see the same patterns repeatedly. Income is the biggest one — not just meeting the threshold on paper, but IND wanting to see it's stable and likely to continue, so a sponsor on a fresh contract, a short-term gig, or early-stage self-employment often fails even with the right number on a payslip. Second is weak proof of a "durable and exclusive" relationship, which hits unmarried, unregistered couples hardest since there's no marriage certificate doing the work for you — thin evidence reads as unconvincing even when the relationship is completely genuine. Missing or lapsed civic integration exam results trip people up too, since the basisexamen abroad is only valid a year. Then there's the boring stuff: documents not properly legalised or apostilled, translations that don't meet the required standard, or a sponsor receiving bijstand (welfare), which almost always fails the income test outright. Prior overstays or immigration violations on either side are a harder, less fixable problem.