Hi Coffee,
Ok here is the letter. I have just amended a few lines to bring it more up to date (since the original was written several weeks ago).
Wayne.
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Dear Sirs,
I am writing on behalf of a sizable number of Federal Skilled Worker Category 1 applicants who share a public forum, who have applied for Permanent Residence to Canada on or after 26th June 2010.
We are wondering if you could please consider clarifying the following questions which we have compiled regarding the immigration process under this category since the new rules were introduced?
Since these questions have been frequently asked in our forum and represent the concerns of many applicants, could we please also ask you to consider adding the questions and their answers to the Frequently Asked Questions section of your website if you think there is sufficient value and merit?
We believe this will help clarify things for many post June 26th 2010 applicants and therefore help reduce phone calls and queries to CIC.
We are very grateful to you for considering us for immigration to Canada, so please take our request for information in the spirit we intend, that we just wish to make things as clear as we can from both sides.
1) CAP limits
We understand the current process is that on receipt of an application it undergoes a completeness check. If that is successful, the funds are encashed and the application then goes through an eligibility review, prior to the applicant being informed and the application being forward to the visa office.
We note you have now published some figures on the CIC web site, which is being updated every few days, regarding how many applications have been received as counting towards the cap for each NOC.
Where there is great confusion is this - do these figures published on the CIC website represent those applications which have only passed the completeness check, or which have also passed an eligibility review? Several parts of your website elude to the phrase "considered for processing" but it is unclear at which side of the eligibility review these applications are being counted.
2) Acknowledgement Of Receipt - timelines
We believe after the eligibility review at CIO is successfully complete, that the applicant should expect to be informed by way of an Acknowledgement Of Receipt (AOR) as their application is forwarded to the visa office for background checks and further processing.
During the past few weeks several members have phoned CIC to enquire on the status of their application. Prior to 19th October they have been told that it will take approximately 10 weeks before they will received an acknowledgement from CIC. Since then, during thee past few weeks, many members are now being told it will take 33 weeks. This is obviously a large jump and falls well outside the current estimate of 45 to 90 days to get an acknowledgement of receipt.
Can you tell please us why there is now such a long expected delay, since we under the impression that by removing the 120 day part of the process that everything should be quicker? Several members have been told by CIC that eligibility reviews have been completed for applications up to the end of September/start of October, yet even the applicants whose application was received at the start of July have yet to receive an AOR.
There are still currently no timelines outlined on the CIC website in this regard, and we believe it will save a lot of unnecessary phone calls of applicants to CIC if some expected timelines can be given.
3) Returned applications
Several of our forum members have reported that their application has been returned prior to encashment of funds, but that they have only just learnt about this and they have never received the application back. They now have to go through the timely and costly process of re-printing their application and re-gathering all their supporting documentation in order that they can submit another application.
We understand that standard Canada post is being used to return applications, but this is evidently leading to some applications being lost, which has led to a lot of distress for a few of our forum members. May we respectfully suggest an amendment to the process, that as part of the processing fees with the initial application a returns fee is included with the fee payment so that a courier may be used to return important documents such as the originals which are included in our applications? Such a fee would be much smaller that then cost of having to re-compile the application if original documents are lost in transit using traditional post.
There are also growing concerns amongst our forum members of identity theft/fraud if their applications with such a large quantity of personal information is lost in the post.
Any clarification you can give us regarding the above would be greatly appreciated.
Best wishes,
X
