1500h work experience because of 14day quarantine

[IceBlaze]

Hey!

First of all, thank you all for taking your time to help me.

I'm in Canada with my girlfriend, both Spanish and just have 2 month left on our WHV.

So that's the thing. In 12 month me and my girlfriend have 1500h (each) of skilled work because we had to do the 14day quarantine when we came to Canada.
The point is: That's absolutely mandatory so there's no way that anyone could make 1560h this year (except working from home during those days).

I already contact with 2 lawyers and both said that they don't have any update from the government but they think that should be something going on with that cause as I said, is mandatory, is not our fault and we came to Canada with a job offer in our hands. So because of an extraordinary situation we don't have any chance to do 1560h during covid.

Our intention is apply for the Express Entry, we both work for Alberta Health Services. I have a permanent position and my girlfriend 1 year contract with extension if we get a work visa. On the CR calculator we have more than 400 points. Se we really have options with the Express Entry, is just that we don't have 1560h because of the F* quarantine! Any solution?

We are desperate, expended lots of money in lawyers, time looking for solutions and we're just running out of ideas.

We know about the Young professional but because we are Spanish we need to stop working 3 months so we'll lose our jobs and remain in Canada losing money with no guaranties that we are going to have the YP.

These are the options:
- Extend our WHV (Not even an option. Just a long shot if someone knows anything about this. Remember that we are from Spain)
- 1500h work for the government
- Young professional in after 3month break with no guaranties

THANKS A LOT!

 

[scylla]

Hey!

First of all, thank you all for taking your time to help me.

I'm in Canada with my girlfriend, both Spanish and just have 2 month left on our WHV.

So that's the thing. In 12 month me and my girlfriend have 1500h (each) of skilled work because we had to do the 14day quarantine when we came to Canada.
The point is: That's absolutely mandatory so there's no way that anyone could make 1560h this year (except working from home during those days).

I already contact with 2 lawyers and both said that they don't have any update from the government but they think that should be something going on with that cause as I said, is mandatory, is not our fault and we came to Canada with a job offer in our hands. So because of an extraordinary situation we don't have any chance to do 1560h during covid.

Our intention is apply for the Express Entry, we both work for Alberta Health Services. I have a permanent position and my girlfriend 1 year contract with extension if we get a work visa. On the CR calculator we have more than 400 points. Se we really have options with the Express Entry, is just that we don't have 1560h because of the F* quarantine! Any solution?

We are desperate, expended lots of money in lawyers, time looking for solutions and we're just running out of ideas.

We know about the Young professional but because we are Spanish we need to stop working 3 months so we'll lose our jobs and remain in Canada losing money with no guaranties that we are going to have the YP.

These are the options:
- Extend our WHV (Not even an option. Just a long shot if someone knows anything about this. Remember that we are from Spain)
- 1500h work for the government
- Young professional in after 3month break with no guaranties

THANKS A LOT!

You definitely need the 1560 hours to count a year of work experience in Canada. Right now you are around two weeks short and can't say you have a year. There are no exceptions to this rule due to the pandemic. 1500 hours won't be accepted as a year.

You're right that you cannot get a second WHV or extend your WHV. However the YP visa is certainly an option if you have an employer who is willing to give you a job offer and deal with the 3 month break. There is also a requirement that you be a resident of Spain at the time you apply for the YP. This means you would need to return to Spain and apply from there for the YP.

If you have the funds, then I suppose one option would be for one of you to switch to a study permit and study full time. The other person could then try applying for a spousal open work permit based on the study permit. Downside is that this is an expensive option and you'd need to show a bank balance of at least $25,000 most likely for the study permit to be approved.

I guess another option would be to switch to a closed work permit without leaving Canada if one of you has an employer who is willing to give you a job offer and get an approved LMIA.

I think that's your list to consider. I can't think of anything else.

EDIT: One other thought. You don't say what province your in. If you haven't done so already, check out the PNP program in that province to see if that may create options for you.

 

[IceBlaze]

You definitely need the 1560 hours to count a year of work experience in Canada. Right now you are around two weeks short and can't say you have a year. There are no exceptions to this rule due to the pandemic. 1500 hours won't be accepted as a year.

You're right that you cannot get a second WHV or extend your WHV. However the YP visa is certainly an option if you have an employer who is willing to give you a job offer and deal with the 3 month break. There is also a requirement that you be a resident of Spain at the time you apply for the YP. This means you would need to return to Spain and apply from there for the YP.

If you have the funds, then I suppose one option would be for one of you to switch to a study permit and study full time. The other person could then try applying for a spousal open work permit based on the study permit. Downside is that this is an expensive option and you'd need to show a bank balance of at least $25,000 most likely for the study permit to be approved.

I guess another option would be to switch to a closed work permit without leaving Canada if one of you has an employer who is willing to give you a job offer and get an approved LMIA.

I think that's your list to consider. I can't think of anything else.

EDIT: One other thought. You don't say what province your in. If you haven't done so already, check out the PNP program in that province to see if that may create options for you.

Oh, right. I forgot to say anything about the LMIA. We already tried this but the person in charge of immigration in our company said that is not able to do this for us. She tried, and she tried pretty hard I think but it didn't work. I actually don't remember why.

We don't have money to study and the 1 year experience is a requisition for the PNP too. Actually you wrote down 100% of our information. We been looking months to get all this!

There's 1 thing that no body told us, not even the lawyers and we have talk a lot about this -- Nobody told us that we need to be in Spain when applying for the YP. Actually we have an apartment (with lease until February 2022) full furnished by us, car, and a pet. So I'm not sure if leaving the country is an option for us, that would be extremely expensive. If we have to do that we probably just stay in Spain and don't come back. Actually both lawyers said that we even could use those 3 months as a vacation travelling in Canada.

Thank you so much for all the information! We really appreciate that!!

 

[scylla]

Oh, right. I forgot to say anything about the LMIA. We already tried this but the person in charge of immigration in our company said that is not able to do this for us. She tried, and she tried pretty hard I think but it didn't work. I actually don't remember why.

We don't have money to study and the 1 year experience is a requisition for the PNP too. Actually you wrote down 100% of our information. We been looking months to get all this!

There's 1 thing that no body told us, not even the lawyers and we have talk a lot about this -- Nobody told us that we need to be in Spain when applying for the YP. Actually we have an apartment (with lease until February 2022) full furnished by us, car, and a pet. So I'm not sure if leaving the country is an option for us, that would be extremely expensive. If we have to do that we probably just stay in Spain and don't come back. Actually both lawyers said that we even could use those 3 months as a vacation travelling in Canada.

Thank you so much for all the information! We really appreciate that!!

The LMIA bit makes sense. They are very hard to obtain. But I asked just in case.

There are different rules for different countries with regards to the IEC program (some lawyers don't seem to know this). Some countries have a requirement that you have to show residency and some do not (most do not). Spain is one of the countries that does. You have to prove you are a resident to qualify / be approved. There is still some chance you could be approved from Canada (you would need to have a residential address in Spain to include your application). However we have seen a number of instances on this forum where people in your situation have been refused since IRCC can clearly see the applicant hasn't resided in their home country for quite some time. So you could pursue this without leaving Canada - but it's a dice roll if it would work because of the residence requirement bit. But you can try.

It sounds like you signed a new lease in Feb this year so you must have had some concrete plans on how you were going to extend your status / remain in Canada given you knew your IECs would expire part way through the year. What were those plans? Did something fall through?

 

[scylla]

Oh, right. I forgot to say anything about the LMIA. We already tried this but the person in charge of immigration in our company said that is not able to do this for us. She tried, and she tried pretty hard I think but it didn't work. I actually don't remember why.

We don't have money to study and the 1 year experience is a requisition for the PNP too. Actually you wrote down 100% of our information. We been looking months to get all this!

There's 1 thing that no body told us, not even the lawyers and we have talk a lot about this -- Nobody told us that we need to be in Spain when applying for the YP. Actually we have an apartment (with lease until February 2022) full furnished by us, car, and a pet. So I'm not sure if leaving the country is an option for us, that would be extremely expensive. If we have to do that we probably just stay in Spain and don't come back. Actually both lawyers said that we even could use those 3 months as a vacation travelling in Canada.

Thank you so much for all the information! We really appreciate that!!

Here's the sticky part as it relates to the IEC (see bolded below). Again, some people to manage to get away applying from within Canada. Others do not.

To be eligible for the Young Professionals category, you must:

• be a Spanish citizen
• have a valid Spanish passportfor the duration of your stay in Canada
  • Your work permit in Canada can’t be valid longer than your passport
• prove you’re a resident of Spain when you apply
  • This means you must give either a residential or mailing address in Spain
• be between the ages of 18 and 35 (inclusive)
• have a minimum of CAN$2,500 to help cover your expenses in Canada
• have health insurancefor the duration of your stay
  • You may have to present evidence of this insurance when you enter Canada
• not be inadmissible to Canada
• have, before departure, a round-trip ticket or demonstrate that you’ll have the financial resources to purchase a departure ticket at the end of your authorized stay in Canada
• have a signed letter of offer or contract of employment in Canada
  • The employment offer must be in your field of expertise (through schooling or work experience) and contribute to your professional development
• not be accompanied by dependants
• pay the fees

https://www.cic.gc.ca/english/work/iec/eligibility.asp?country=es&cat=yp&#country_category_name_cont

 

[IceBlaze]

The LMIA bit makes sense. They are very hard to obtain. But I asked just in case.

There are different rules for different countries with regards to the IEC program (some lawyers don't seem to know this). Some countries have a requirement that you have to show residency and some do not (most do not). Spain is one of the countries that does. You have to prove you are a resident to qualify / be approved. There is still some chance you could be approved from Canada (you would need to have a residential address in Spain to include your application). However we have seen a number of instances on this forum where people in your situation have been refused since IRCC can clearly see the applicant hasn't resided in their home country for quite some time. So you could pursue this without leaving Canada - but it's a dice roll if it would work because of the residence requirement bit. But you can try.

It sounds like you signed a new lease in Feb this year so you must have had some concrete plans on how you were going to extend your status / remain in Canada given you knew your IECs would expire part way through the year. What were those plans? Did something fall through?

That's great.. We are just having problems because we are Spanish. I really hate Spain at this point. 3months break, go back to Spain, no visa extension, etc.. It's pretty clear that Spain don't want his people going out of Spain.

We have a residence in Spain so that may work. But the thing is that we need to wait until November. That is going to be at least 3-4 months without income and we have no guaranties about getting the YP or if the pool will be open. A solution is work remotely for a company in Spain, but still. There's no guaranties and that's a lot of money and problems just because our mandatory 14 days quarantine. It sounds as a terrible joke to me. It's crazy.

Yes, my girlfriend had a job offer until Feb and our lawyer said that will be easy to extend our visa since we both work for the government, in a skilled and essential job related with covid and health. The lease was way cheaper that way that month by month. Now, turns out that is not that easy and probably the rent will be way more expensive.

We just have 2months left and we really don't know what to do. There's options but really risky and expensive. All because a mandatory quarantine and having our permanent, government, skilled, essential, bla bla jobs.

 

[scylla]

That's great.. We are just having problems because we are Spanish. I really hate Spain at this point. 3months break, go back to Spain, no visa extension, etc.. It's pretty clear that Spain don't want his people going out of Spain.

We have a residence in Spain so that may work. But the thing is that we need to wait until November. That is going to be at least 3-4 months without income and we have no guaranties about getting the YP or if the pool will be open. A solution is work remotely for a company in Spain, but still. There's no guaranties and that's a lot of money and problems just because our mandatory 14 days quarantine. It sounds as a terrible joke to me. It's crazy.

Yes, my girlfriend had a job offer until Feb and our lawyer said that will be easy to extend our visa since we both work for the government, in a skilled and essential job related with covid and health. The lease was way cheaper that way that month by month. Now, turns out that is not that easy and probably the rent will be way more expensive.

We just have 2months left and we really don't know what to do. There's options but really risky and expensive. All because a mandatory quarantine and having our permanent, government, skilled, essential, bla bla jobs.

I don't know why the lawyer said it would be easy to extend your visas. That doesn't make sense to me.

Anyway - I think you have all the information available at this point for what options are available to you. Good luck.

 

[IceBlaze]

I don't know why the lawyer said it would be easy to extend your visas. That doesn't make sense to me.

Anyway - I think you have all the information available at this point for what options are available to you. Good luck.

Thank you so much for all your help! Have a great day!