@legalfalcon , I would be grateful if you can advise me on my situation. Please let me know what is the best that I could do now.
Your notes have Review required and a you have pointed out the issues with your reference letter. Lets tackle the issues one by one:
* My employment letter does not have the salary mentioned as per the standard company template (Name, Designation, Duration, Duties, Skills). I had failed to upload pay stubs with my application. I have with me now, the last 6 months' pay stubs before the end of employment. Will it be fine for the review, if I upload just the pay stubs through a webform?
Yes, send the pay stubs and also a LoE indicating why you did not have them before.
* My employment letter does not have the number of working hours mentioned, but I do not see anything about the same in the notes. The notes even mention that the
Letter confirms full/time employment. Could someone advise if the paystubs alone will address the analyst's concerns on work experience?
Your work reference letter should have the number of hours worked, and the pay stubs by themselves will not meet this requirement, unless your pay stubs show your pay on an hourly basis and indicate the number of hours you worked per week or month. If your employer cannot give you a work reference letter with the number of hours worked, then you can get a letter from a colleague, a supervisor and it need not be on a company letter head and submit that to meet this.
* Is the Review on my settlement funds related to my salary not being mentioned in the employment letter? Or is it because I had shown much more than the required amount, that too through a gift deed? For my POF, I have attached a Bank Summary statement, Bank statements showing the amount transferred, Gift deeds from my mother and brother on Notarized Affidavit.
For most applicants who have RR for PoF, is because the PoF may be in a foreign currency. Also make sure that your gift deed meets the requirements of a inter vivos gift.
Is there anything that I should add to address possible concerns?
* The notes state
Points revised to 0, and mention
Ready to Finalize. Does this mean I am near to be refused or can I provide additional documents to ensure my eligibility will pass?
This only means that the officer will make a final determination on the RR issues and if he concludes otherwise, then your application is ready to be finalised.
* Under the Activity section, the latest activity for Activity Type: Selection-EE Econ, Field Name: Status, The Value was 'Review Required' for Activity 1 and then 'Cancelled' for Activity 2. Does anyone know what this could mean?
Cancelled only means that the specific check was not required this is normal, no need to be concerned.
* Any tips on what my LOE could say?
Keep you LoE short, and to the point. Explain each point under a separate heading and refer to the documents that you will submit with it.
Understanding “Review Required”
A lot of applicants see “review required” in their GCMS notes for eligibility. There are many theories floating around with regard to what “review required” means and if it is alarming.
Before I venture into explaining the significance, it is important to understand that each application goes through the following stages as per the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the regulations (Canadian Immigration Law):
R10 – Completeness Check
Criminality
Medicals
A11.2 – eligibility
Security
Out of the above, the most important stage is eligibility. This is also the most time-consuming stage because your documents have to be verified, evaluated and assessed to ascertain that you meet the eligibility criteria for the program you have applied (FSW / CEC / FTW). To stream line this process and make it easier for an immigration officer (decision making authority), all applications are first evaluated by case analysts or program assistants. They review the documents and summarize it in the GCMS. If they have any concerns with any document or want the immigration officer to carefully look into a specific document, they will flag it as “review required.” It is the content of the note that is important here. If the review required is for a specific document, while the summary of the note says that an applicant has met the eligibility, or “ready to finalize” it simply means that while the applicant has met the eligibility criteria, but the specific document needs a careful examination form the officer before promoting (eligibility pass) by the officer.
However, if there are concerns, there will be a review required for the eligibility, and there will be no text to the effect “ready to finalize” or pass. The note will specifically state job duties do not match, or the employment cannot be verified, or the number of years of work experience claimed cannot be verified. This is where an application can land in muddy waters. But the final decision rests on the immigration officer. He may override the decision of the analyst / assistant or go with the analysis of the analyst / assistant.
Even in cases where the analyst / assistant is of the opinion that the applicant has met the eligibility, and there is no “review required,” the officer can replace it with his own opinion. Though rare, but it does happen. This is why the eligibility is only passed when an officer conclusively marks the eligibility as passed.
Finally, there is “review required” for PoF. This is the most common in many applications. This is because, the financial and banking practices of each country are different. Eg. Fixed deposits are know as Certificate of Deposit (CD) in the US. Similarly, treasury bonds, mutual funds, stocks, and many other investment vehicles are there. If your PoF anything other than a bank deposit, it is more likely that it will be marked as “review required.” Also, IRCC does not go by day to day fluctuations in FOREX. Instead, the Canadian federal government issued a quarterly conversion rate for all FOREX vis-a-via CAD. If your PoF is in a foreign currency, then you may have “review required” for the officer to make a determination.
Just because you have “review required” does not mean that you hit the panic mode. Instead, read the context in which it is there. If there is a concern regarding a document, you can send a replacement document via CSE. The most common reasons for RR are:
1. Work reference letter without job duties
2. Work reference letters missing all the details requested by IRCC
3. If you submitted a letter from a colleague because you were unable to get one from your employer, but did not have a LoE on file, this too will lead to RR.
4. Not sufficient work experience in the primary NOC.
5. Inability to verify your employment as your employer details are missing.
There are just some of the scenarios.
Hope this helps.