Response by
@simpsol22 covers it.
BUT for CLARIFICATION: That does not necessarily mean the local office has logged receipt of the file or otherwise taken any action on it.
This is similar to AOR. It is weeks, sometime months, sometimes several months, AFTER applicants have SENT their application to the CPC-Sydney, and for those who use a confirmation of delivery service to send it, months AFTER it is known that CPC-Sydney actually has the file, BEFORE CPC-Sydney acknowledges it has the application. Any effort to check GCMS for the location of the file between the date it was SENT and in fact received, and the AOR date, will NOT show the application to be in CPC-Sydney. But that is where it is (with limited exceptions, such as file already in mail being returned; and perhaps some applications are referred for a "Secondary Review" rather than sent to the local office).
This is similar to what happens when files are referred (sent) from CPC-Sydney to the local office . . . except that it is not uncommon for a local office to take an even longer period of time to, in effect, take some action on the file so that GCMS will show that the file is in the local office. That is, CPC-Sydney has SENT the file but in GCMS it does not appear that the file is in the respective local office until sometime later.
Which quite likely explains:
Cannot for sure explain where your file was when.
BUT, that said, once your application had In Process status, it is most likely it was indeed transferred to the local office and had indeed left Nova Scotia. Rather, GCMS did not show it in the local office, as such, because the local office had taken no action on the file, having done nothing yet to even acknowledge or show the file to be in the local office. In contrast, so long as GCMS confirmed the application was "IP" (In Progress), actually GCMS was showing the file had been SENT from CPC-Sydney to the respective local office. (With exceptions as noted above.)
It is often misguided to rely on GCMS in an effort to obtain information about an application before getting formal notice of this or that. Among events which typically occur before GCMS shows the event there are:
-- physical receipt of the application itself occurs, at the least weeks and usually a month or three, before GCMS shows the file in Sydney
-- file located in local office occurs weeks or months before GCMS might show local office possession of the file
-- formal background clearances from RCMP or CSIS are often complete well before GCMS notes will reflect this (this too is similar to how AOR works; the clearance is done and sent to the file but does not show in GCMS until a local office officer takes some action on the file and in effect registers the clearances)
These are just SOME of the many reasons why obtaining GCMS notes is a wasted effort for most applicants. (Which is NOT to diminish the importance of obtaining GCMS notes, or the physical file, in circumstances warranting more proactive measures.)
