sistemc said:
BTW, according to other threads/posts in this forum currently the time difference between application sent and test date is 2 months for most of the applicants. Then oath wait time varies more, now it is between 1 - 3 months.
So I do not agree with your statement that current average processing time is 7 months.
Forum posts about individual experience are not based on a representative sample, far from it. Moreover, the size of the sample is far to small to be anywhere near statistically relevant. And, unfortunately, to a significant extent some of this information derives from unreliable sources.
Spreadsheet data collections suffer likewise.
To the extent there is reliable reporting, such reports can illustrate how quickly (or, conversely, how slowly) IRCC is processing
some applications. This is a long way from indicating an average or likely processing time, or how long it takes for most routine applications.
Moreover, average processing time is largely uninformative. An extra long processing time for just a small percentage of applications will skewer the average to be much higher than how long it takes for most applicants.
The
median processing time will indicate how long it takes for
most (technically one short of most) applications. This information used to be available through statistics Canada (and might still be), albeit in a not easily accessible format. Until around 2011 (time flies and I forget how long it has been precisely), this information was published by CIC, which used to publish how long it took to process 80 percent, and 50 percent, and either 20 or 30 percent (again, I forget precisely) of applications. That was useful information. Unfortunately the Harper government believed this led applicants to begin flooding the system with inquiries about the progress of their individual cases too soon too often too much. (Although, generally the Harper government was also engaged in a profound cutback in information provided the public, and the Liberal government has done little to reverse this.)
IRCC web site currently displays 12 months as the processing time for new applicants. That is based on how long it took to process 80 percent of routine applications in the recent past. This time is typically significantly longer than how long it takes to process 50 percent, or
the median, which again would be more useful information.
While in the past, the 80 percent figure tended to be nearly twice as long as the 50 percent amount, as the overall time line decreases the difference between these is also likely to shrink.
Without revisiting Statistics Canada (assuming it still provides the more robust data, including processing times for 50 percent of applications), there is no where near enough reliable data to definitively estimate what the prospective time line is for
most applicants today . . .
but seven months would be a very good guess (noting that this is
not an
average but about how long it takes for most applicants).
For anyone who is interested in real data about the timelines, I'd suggest trying to navigate Statistics Canada to find the most recent data that is provided.
