Totally agree with you! If I wasn't still in the midst of being frustrated, I could probably articulate myself better as you have done here. Unfortunately, we were dealt a set of circumstances which caused us to experience more delays and perhaps officers which were less efficient than others. Chalk it up to bad luck. However, it is also what I have been saying all along ... there are some steps which I believe should be standard to what all officers at all VO's should follow. There should be timelines followed for certain steps which all applicants go through. For example, it took them 7 weeks for them to transfer our file (i.e. for them to open our file at the VO after SA). Other applicants I saw from this VO or from other VO's took only took 3 weeks. This step should be standardized. They should at least assign your case to someone in that time ... and it not, this is a red flag that the VO is understaffed etc. This already added an extra month to our processing and it had nothing to do with our case being more complicated or us requiring an interview. This alone is very upsetting to me and anyone else who experienced this. And when they send out requests for RCMP reports ... do it when they ask for the Schedule A and PCC's etc. There seems to be no rhyme or reason as to why and when they ask for these things. Some people get the requests fast and some don't get them until later or not at all. If they asked for that right away, I wouldn't have bothered ordering GCMS notes and stressing out over the whole thing.
Weird things they seem to do like in Mexico ... they appeared to process the applications in batches hence why they didn't probably open our app until 7 weeks had passed. We were unlucky in that I think we missed the last batch and ended up being put in the next batch's pile which was almost 2 months later. I'm sure other VO's have their own little idiosyncracies too.
I didn't go into this thinking it was going to be a cake walk and we would be outta here by 6 months. However, there were some things which were very upsetting about how they processed us and seeing other people escape some of these frustrations and get processed faster (even the ones needing interviews) echoes your sentiments about there being inequality in the system, which in my opinion can be lessened with some standard procedures which Visa officers should follow so they can help alleviate some of the frustrations applicants feel.
BTW, congratulations on being finished with the process! Enjoy the next chapter of your life with your spouse!
