When a spouse's points push CRS above a targeted PNP stream's cutoff, but removing the spouse entirely drops the score too far and requires a 'spouse not accompanying' declaration, there's a middle path worth trying first.
What group members advised:- Remove only the spouse's education points, not the spouse's entire application, to bring the CRS down into range while keeping them as an accompanying applicant.
- If still not enough, also adjust the spouse's language (IELTS) score as a second lever.
- Apply these changes incrementally — don't remove both education and language points at once without checking where the score lands, since it's easy to overcorrect.
The core idea: CRS factors tied to a spouse can be tuned individually rather than being an all-or-nothing decision about including them on the application.