Example of a business plan for a Owner-Operator LMIA

[BeaverTails]

Hello,

I'm a British national with a UK-incorporated business and looking to move to Canada – the best path seems to be to move the business to Canada under the Owner-Operator program.

I loosely understand the process to be as follows:

> Form Company in Canada
> Make a business plan
> Apply for an LMIA as an employer (with job promotion exemption)
> Apply for a Work Permit from ESDC with the positive-LMIA (2yr)
> Later apply for PR (via EE)

It'd seem like having a watertight business plan is the most challenging part of the process. I was wondering if anyone has seen some good examples of a business plan that has been specially put together for Canadian immigration purposes? I'd like to get a feel of how involved this would be and what I'm getting myself into!

If anyone has insights into anything obvious that I've missed in the above list, I'd greatly appreciate hearing about it

Thanks!

 

[theguv]

I'm in a similar position. UK based, self employed though, looking to get my business over to Canada. I've got a Federal Self Employed Visas Application in process but I've recently heard about this Owner/Operator LMIA Work Permit and it sounds perfect to get my feet on the ground.

I've never written a business plan before so I went hunting and found this from Quickbooks: https://quickbooks.intuit.com/cas/dam/DOCUMENT/A0q0RIjz0/How-to-write-a-business-plan-template.pdf

Needless to say I'll be using the hell out of it!

 

[thevisawhisperer]

Hello,

I'm a British national with a UK-incorporated business and looking to move to Canada – the best path seems to be to move the business to Canada under the Owner-Operator program.

I loosely understand the process to be as follows:

> Form Company in Canada
> Make a business plan
> Apply for an LMIA as an employer (with job promotion exemption)
> Apply for a Work Permit from ESDC with the positive-LMIA (2yr)
> Later apply for PR (via EE)

It'd seem like having a watertight business plan is the most challenging part of the process. I was wondering if anyone has seen some good examples of a business plan that has been specially put together for Canadian immigration purposes? I'd like to get a feel of how involved this would be and what I'm getting myself into!

If anyone has insights into anything obvious that I've missed in the above list, I'd greatly appreciate hearing about it

Thanks!

You might also consider Intra-company transfer, which is an LMIA exempt work permit that adds points to your EE application after a year spent on the job. I would consider all non-LMIA options before going that route.

 

[BeaverTails]

Thanks for the tip, @thevisawhisperer.

The ICT path sounds like a viable option. I'll certainly look into further. Might you happen to know of any good guides/resource that would be a good starting point?

 

[thevisawhisperer]

Start here:
https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/corporate/publications-manuals/operational-bulletins-manuals/temporary-residents/foreign-workers/exemption-codes/intra-company-transferees.html

 

[Dr.Pjmn]

Hello,

I'm a British national with a UK-incorporated business and looking to move to Canada – the best path seems to be to move the business to Canada under the Owner-Operator program.

I loosely understand the process to be as follows:

> Form Company in Canada
> Make a business plan
> Apply for an LMIA as an employer (with job promotion exemption)
> Apply for a Work Permit from ESDC with the positive-LMIA (2yr)
> Later apply for PR (via EE)

It'd seem like having a watertight business plan is the most challenging part of the process. I was wondering if anyone has seen some good examples of a business plan that has been specially put together for Canadian immigration purposes? I'd like to get a feel of how involved this would be and what I'm getting myself into!

If anyone has insights into anything obvious that I've missed in the above list, I'd greatly appreciate hearing about it

Thanks!

try these :

https://smallbusinessbc.ca/article/10-common-business-plan-mistakes/

https://www.futurpreneur.ca/en/resources/start-up-business-planning/tips-tools/business-plan-writer/?it=business-planning/sample-business-plans-and-templates/&it=eng/page/2752/

https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/employment-business/business/managing-a-business/starting-a-business

 

[Dr.Pjmn]

Here you find another blank business plan template and example from bdc.ca

https://www.bdc.ca/en/articles-tools/entrepreneur-toolkit/templates-business-guides/pages/business-plan-template.aspx

 

[Ehsan Zafer]

Hello,

I'm a British national with a UK-incorporated business and looking to move to Canada – the best path seems to be to move the business to Canada under the Owner-Operator program.

I loosely understand the process to be as follows:

> Form Company in Canada
> Make a business plan
> Apply for an LMIA as an employer (with job promotion exemption)
> Apply for a Work Permit from ESDC with the positive-LMIA (2yr)
> Later apply for PR (via EE)

It'd seem like having a watertight business plan is the most challenging part of the process. I was wondering if anyone has seen some good examples of a business plan that has been specially put together for Canadian immigration purposes? I'd like to get a feel of how involved this would be and what I'm getting myself into!

If anyone has insights into anything obvious that I've missed in the above list, I'd greatly appreciate hearing about it

Thanks!

Hi there,

Have you started working on your plan?
If yes, could you kindly enlist the process?
Is it the same that you've stated above?
Did you do things on your own or opted for an immigration lawyer to assist you with the process?

 

[BeaverTails]

Hi Ehsan.

I've not yet made a start on the plan.

There's a bunch of documentation and first person accounts on many of the immigration programs, but relatively seems to be out there online for the owner-operator path.

This makes it more likely that I'll end up working with an immigration lawyer. That said, I think there's a good amount of homework that can done on items like the business plan, to help reduce the amount of involvement (and thus, cost) of a lawyer.

I'll be sure to share my story here on the forum as I make progress (likely to commence in the coming months).

Curious to read other people's accounts + advice as well

Good luck with your journey, Ehsan!

Thanks,
Keith

 

[Ehsan Zafer]

Thanks Keith for the update. Keep in touch as you progress. I've still to decide which one to opt for - Start-up visa program OR Owner Operator LMIA program.

 

[Ehsan Zafer]

Hi Ehsan.

I've not yet made a start on the plan.

There's a bunch of documentation and first person accounts on many of the immigration programs, but relatively seems to be out there online for the owner-operator path.

This makes it more likely that I'll end up working with an immigration lawyer. That said, I think there's a good amount of homework that can done on items like the business plan, to help reduce the amount of involvement (and thus, cost) of a lawyer.

I'll be sure to share my story here on the forum as I make progress (likely to commence in the coming months).

Curious to read other people's accounts + advice as well

Good luck with your journey, Ehsan!

Thanks,
Keith

https://www.ontario.ca/page/oinp-entrepreneur-stream#section-0
This is a useful link I found. Hope this is of help to you too.

 

[rajkumarl]

Hello,

I'm a British national with a UK-incorporated business and looking to move to Canada – the best path seems to be to move the business to Canada under the Owner-Operator program.

I loosely understand the process to be as follows:

> Form Company in Canada
> Make a business plan
> Apply for an LMIA as an employer (with job promotion exemption)
> Apply for a Work Permit from ESDC with the positive-LMIA (2yr)
> Later apply for PR (via EE)

It'd seem like having a watertight business plan is the most challenging part of the process. I was wondering if anyone has seen some good examples of a business plan that has been specially put together for Canadian immigration purposes? I'd like to get a feel of how involved this would be and what I'm getting myself into!

If anyone has insights into anything obvious that I've missed in the above list, I'd greatly appreciate hearing about it

Thanks!

The process is right as mentioned by you. I have incorporated my Business in 2018 Nov, was busy with product development in 2019, Applied for LMIA in Mar 2020, got the approval on 14 July 2020. Applied for Work permit still awaiting work permit approval, there are tremendous delays due to COVID19.

As far as Business Plan is concerned, there are companies that specialize in converting your existing business plan or creating from scratch/
www.joorney.ca is who I used.

They had to include sections related to the LMIA work permit included, which generally not part of a traditional business plan one uses for their business.

Hope this explains.

 

[BeaverTails]

This is very helpful. Thank you for sharing, @rajkumarl.

Whilst you're still waiting for the work permit, it's quite impressive that you were able to get the LMIA approved in just 4-months. Hopefully, you'll soon receive your work permit, too!

Might you be able to share some of the approximate costs of the process thus far? Were you able to do much of the LMIA yourself, or did you use Joorney do much of that as well? I figure that it should be okay to do the core work of the business plan myself, and then hire someone like Joorney to edit it so that it better primed for LMIA-approval.

Cheers,
Keith

 

[rajkumarl]

This is very helpful. Thank you for sharing, @rajkumarl.

Whilst you're still waiting for the work permit, it's quite impressive that you were able to get the LMIA approved in just 4-months. Hopefully, you'll soon receive your work permit, too!

Might you be able to share some of the approximate costs of the process thus far? Were you able to do much of the LMIA yourself, or did you use Joorney do much of that as well? I figure that it should be okay to do the core work of the business plan myself, and then hire someone like Joorney to edit it so that it better primed for LMIA-approval.

Cheers,
Keith

Hi Keith,
LMIA was supposed to be Interview exempted for CEO/Founder. The process per COVID was two weeks. I had 5 rounds of calls with the officer looking into my case. 15 sets of mail exchange with Questions that were covered in the Business plan had to explain again. Had to write justifications. again and again, ultimately it was approved.

Patience is the key to this process as IRCC just wants to ensure that they don't want to give visas to legitimate businesses or business that is set up just for getting into the country.

Perseverance is what is required for this stream.

 

[rajkumarl]

Might you be able to share some of the approximate costs of the process thus far?

USD 2300 for Business Plan

Were you able to do much of the LMIA yourself, or did you use Joorney do much of that as well?
I used a based Toronto Lawyer. Including the business Plan, they charged USD 12,000(includes the PR application processing as well)
I could ve done the application processing myself. Now the LMIA process has gone online it's even easier. However, what is done is done

I figure that it should be okay to do the core work of the business plan myself, and then hire someone like Joorney to edit it so that it better primed for LMIA-approval.

Agreed. you can take the positions that you need to hire with the right rates by the city.

You will have to hire at least one PR or Citizen. The Canadian Govt job database provides the rates for each. You need to show your projected hiring plan and explain each roles(These things will be done by Joorney). You just give them a recruitment plan.

I would suggest not to go through a lawyer as I found them to be very slow.

Hope this explains