I have e-mailed the London Office several times over the past 3 years and have only had the courtesy of a reply once.
They are the most incompetant office I have come across, so far they have taken 3 years and 10 months to process my son's (accompanying dependant residing overseas) application. My part of the application was finalised well over a year ago and the only thing holding up the issuing of our PR is the London Office.
They couldn't find his file, notified him he was a non-accompanying dependant, retracted that and admitted he was accompanying, failed to look at his file for over a year, lost his Police certificate and have not re-issued the medical forms after they stated he must submit a new medical report as, due to their incompetance, the previous one had expired. They informed the Minister for Immigration that, provided they received the information they required (updated background forms, photographs and Police Certificate) they would instruct Vegreville to issue me with my PR within 12 weeks from September 13th and then he would be issued with his once I had "landed". The information was sent to them in October and acknowledgement of receipt is showing on the web interface, but we are still waiting.
Their web site states that they will expedite dependant children applicants in order to reunite families and that they aim to complete the PR process within 6 months of sponsorship approval. Tell that to my son, who has been waiting for nearly 4 years to join me in Canada.
I intend to lodge a complaint as soon as we finally get our PR!