here's my journey:
I'm a FSW-O, single applicant, and I'm a female by the way
(not a US resident), AOR: July 30,2018
MEP & IP1 : August 21 & 22,2018
then a complete silence till Feb 28 2019 : my background check changed to "not applicable"
March1st,2019 : refusal letter, got an email and opened my account to find it instead of the ppr email.
Throughout this period i requested gcms notes twice , and had a number of calls with IRCC agents.
The agents always answered me that my application is "under review" and that my criminality & security haven't started yet. that was all they had to say , even on the same day before I got my refusal letter.
the first gcms notes were recieved three months later! (ordered through ATIP, so i don't recommend that ).
the 2nd gcms recieved after 3 weeks or so (through getgcms.com) (that was fast).
in that 2nd set of notes, received on Feb, 9th, 2019, I discovered the issue with my application.
it was a POF issue, the officer reviewing my application has misinterpreted my bank statement, as i saved my money in the bank in the form of "certificates of deposites" (fixed deposits) , he/she interpreted them as "lines of credit"!!! which completely screwed up me complying to the requirements of the settlement funds.
the next day , i raised a cse , clarifying my situation and providing more documents from the bank, but apparantly that wasn't considered, obviously they had made up their decision by then, and the application was then pending sending the refusal letter.( that's why it is crucial to order notes in appropriate times to allow you to follow up with your status).
After receiving the refusal letter, life went black.
i raised a cse asking if there was an appeal, the following day i sent another cse for a "reconsideration request" attaching all the documents I had and clarifying my situation.
after 10 days or so , an agent replied to my first cse , where i was asking about the appeal, and asked me to provide any new documents with a deadline that was a week ahead. I thought she wanted to request me herself a reconsideration.
after few days, today i received an email notification to check my account , to find the golden email.
I created a new profile ..I was going to repeat the whole process from the begining.. but at this point I guess I was lucky enough to end my tiring journey today