Hi, I had just seen replies in this thread and I'm new to write something here.
I want to share my flagpole experience yesterday (Mar 29, 2022). I visited one border on Quebec province (There are 2 as far as I know).
First of all, I applied for PGWP in Jan 21, 2022 and had not received anything after WP-EXT letter.
It took around an hour from Montreal, QC to reach the border by a car.
I directly went to the US border and an officer let me proceed to the inspection area.
For
flagpole individuals,
neither I-94 (Temporary Visa) nor ESTA needed in the US border. Also,
no need to take any COVID tests.
After I got an instruction that I need to drive to 'Go to Canada' direction, the officer (US side) gave my passport and documents to me before I went to the Canada side.
I drove through the Canada border and the border officer there asked me the purpose (Work permit-PGWP).
The border office asked me to proceed to the parking area by Canada Border Services Agency office.
I submitted my documents (Passport, Student permit, documents written for an online application - 2 documents in my case, transcript, completion letter) and
was asked to wait in the car due to the capacity inside the office.
*
For the transcipt, I forgot to bring the sealed one, but I brought the printed
official transcipt because I already had the PDF version of it. (And I got approved!)
I arrived there before 1PM (Processing hours: Noon-7PM, Mon-Thur, check here:
https://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/travel-voyage/settle-setablir-eng.html) and there are several persons there (but not many).
For me, I spent 1 hour and 40 minutes in the car and got a phone call that I may enter the office.
No biometrics needed in this time. (I paid for the fees without biometrics fee.)
* There was a
background check in the application this time. I hadn't had it when I applied for student permit and its extension before.
Because I got angry due to the processing time, I tried flagpoling in this time.
After I came back home, I checked the application numbers of the prior/current PGWP application.
Between two months (Jan 21 - Mar 29), the difference is around 480K. I guess this can be the reason for slow processing
if the number increases 1 per application.
If you are urgent, I suggest you to go to the border with full documents.
Hope your best wishes.