Hi! I apologize if this is very tl;dr. Hopefully all of this information helps clarify things and doesn't further confuse! I know going the DIY route for spousal sponsorship can be a bit confusing and overwhelming, but it's very doable!
So at least for me, I got the AOR 22 days after I submitted my PR application and the average is about 1 month. My spouse and I were VERY thorough with ours. If you don't hear anything soon, it's possible that your application might have been incomplete, and if that's the case then they will return it to you which will cause a bit of a delay for you -- but hopefully that's not the case and the AOR will come very soon!
Step 1: Get the AOR. The AOR is an email message that will be sent to the Sponsor's email (yours). It will be addressed to you, as the Sponsor. Once you have the AOR (Acknowledgement of Receipt) email, your husband (PA) can then apply for the OWP (Open Work Permit).
The OWP and the SOWP are two different things. SOWP (Spousal Open Work Permit) is for spouses of persons who are in Canada for other reasons (most often this is usually for when the person is in Canada on a work visa and brought their spouse with them, or for a person who is in Canada on a study permit and brought their spouse with them). The OWP is better than the SOWP because the SOWP is an accompanying permit that is reliant on the validity of the spouse's work or study permit, whereas the OWP is a permit that's really only granted to refugees and spousal PR applicants because it gives you the ability to work almost anywhere.
OWP is optional, but I recommend that your husband gets the OWP since you are doing spousal sponsorship in QC. The OWP will give your husband valid status as a Worker for 2 years from the date the OWP is approved (and since it takes about 24 months -- aka 2 years -- to get PR in QC, this will give your husband valid status as a Worker for most -- if not all -- of the waiting time while the PR application is processing). And usually it takes about 1-3 months for an OWP application to be approved.
Step 2: Apply for OWP. This is a great resource for navigating the OWP application:
Keep the AOR email handy and safe because your husband will need to provide a digital copy of it to IRCC for the OWP, but it will
not be sent to MIFI immediately after you get the AOR. You will have to wait.
While you are working on completing things for the OWP, IRCC will continue reviewing the PR Application. The first thing IRCC checks out is the Eligibility of the PA. Once IRCC realizes that you are applying for PR in QC, they will pause your application during this review because IRCC can not process applications to QC that are not yet authorized by QC. To get that authorization, you will need a CSQ (for PA) and approval from QC to serve as a Sponsor (for sponsor).
Usually, if there are no obvious issues with your Eligibility, IRCC will send you the
Invitation to Submit an Undertaking/Invitation to Apply for CSQ. It will be addressed to the Sponsor and sent to the Sponsor's email. This letter will look very similar to the AOR except it will be a pdf document attachment instead of in the body of the email itself. You can
not apply for Undertaking/CSQ with MIFI until you get this letter because a photocopy or print-out of it has to be included with your Undertaking/CSQ application paperwork.
Step 3: Apply for CSQ + Undertaking. Once you receive the Invitation letter, you can then send your Undertaking Application (Sponsor) and CSQ Application (PA) to MIFI.
The Invitation letter will specify that you have 30 days to send IRCC evidence that you have applied with MIFI -- what IRCC
wants you to send them is the Confirmation of Receipt letter (which is also sometimes referred to as a
different AOR) from MIFI. However, MIFI is a bit... slow, and most people don't receive their Confirmation letter within the 30-day timeframe. Instead of giving IRCC the Confirmation letter, you can use the Web Form to send IRCC a digital scan of your mailing receipt from the post office to prove that you have submitted your Undertaking and CSQ application to MIFI so that your PR application is not delayed.
There is no online way to submit the Undertaking/CSQ application and, as such, there isn't a good way to track the application after it is sent via postal mail to MIFI.
Once you receive the Confirmation letter from MIFI indicating that they have accepted your application for review, I recommend sending the Confirmation letter to IRCC via Web Form at that point even if it is after the initial 30 days. It just keeps IRCC up-to-date on what's happening with your application and MIFI will not send this letter to IRCC, so it's good for you to be proactive with it.
It usually takes 1-3 months for an application to MIFI to be approved and for the CSQ + Undertaking Approval to be received in your postal mailbox. I applied around the same time as 3 other people and we all had to send ours twice for various reasons. So do not be alarmed if you end up getting your application returned as Incomplete the first time (mine was returned because my credit card declined, so I 100% recommend adding a Postal Mail Order with your application for the payment -- it was SO much easier for me). This application is also French-only (I think they are working on an English version of the forms, but it wasn't available yet when I applied).
Step 4: Send the CSQ and Undertaking/Sponsor Approval Letter to IRCC via the Web Form. Since I've mentioned it a few times, here is the link to the Web Form you'll want to use throughout this process:
https://secure.cic.gc.ca/ClientContact/en/Application/Form/72
When your CSQ + Undertaking Application is approved, you will receive an envelope in your postal mailbox that will include 1 stamped copy of your approved application, 1 letter of Sponsor Undertaking Approval, 1 Letter of PA Eligibility Approval, and 2 copies of the CSQ.
Now, MIFI is
supposed to be responsible for sending these approvals to IRCC, and they will
eventually send them (assuming they don't lose track of the paperwork, which does happen sometimes). But since IRCC can not move forward with the PR application until these documents are given to them, it helps move your application along a little bit quicker (not a lot quicker, but a little bit) if you
don't wait on MIFI to send the approvals over to IRCC and to, instead, scan the CSQ and the Undertaking Approval (front and back) and send them to IRCC yourself with the Web Form.
Aaaand with that, if you have any other questions, please let me know! I am happy to help or share any info I can from my own experience
