Thread for Outland LONDON, UK Applications!

[Sar03]

You guys are all lovely, thanks so much. I've calmed down quite a bit after yesterday's, er, display - never been that angry about a stupid message board before, haha. But the support has been fantastic. Cheers, you all rock. <3

I also wanted to acknowledge all the hard work that you guys have done (and are still doing) just to help others WITHOUT seeking any benefits in return. The least we can do is thank you, so THANK YOU.

I usually don’t have any questions but I am a regular reader of this forum and it does calm me down everyday and have increased my knowledge tremendously. I am sure there are many other like me who are the quietly admiring your work so don’t be disappointed of any negative feedback/comment.

Oh and the spreadsheet is AWESOME!!!
Thank you again!

 

[gander]

Hey,

Got SA today, and it got sent to London I was really hoping it would go to Mississauga but there we go. If you could update the spreadsheet that would be great, thanks.

 

[andrew-brit]

Hey,

Got SA today, and it got sent to London I was really hoping it would go to Mississauga but there we go. If you could update the spreadsheet that would be great, thanks.

Spreadsheet updated. I am glad you finally got SA! Fingers crossed it is plain sailing for you now!

 

[songbird82]

Hi,
I'm a newbie to these forums and wanted to thank all of you who maintain the spreadsheet. I'd like to be added if possible. I'm a Canadian from Edmonton, AB husband is a kiwi living in London.
Our application was received on Dec. 1, 2014 and medical results are shown as received. Our application began being processed on Feb. 25, 2015 and I received SA Stage One approval on Mar. 13, 2015 and at that time the letter stated that our application was to remain in Mississauga for further processing. I had my local MP call and the CIC agent she spoke with said that our application would "very likely" remain in Mississauga to be processed and to expect a wait time of under a year, this was just last week but today I received an e-mail from CIC stating that our application has been sent to London, UK. I'm very concerned! Has anyone else had such a thing happen? Why are some sent to London while other stay in Canada since the London office is so backlogged?!

 

[andrew-brit]

Hi,
I'm a newbie to these forums and wanted to thank all of you who maintain the spreadsheet. I'd like to be added if possible. I'm a Canadian from Edmonton, AB husband is a kiwi living in London.
Our application was received on Dec. 1, 2014 and medical results are shown as received. Our application began being processed on Feb. 25, 2015 and I received SA Stage One approval on Mar. 13, 2015 and at that time the letter stated that our application was to remain in Mississauga for further processing. I had my local MP call and the CIC agent she spoke with said that our application would "very likely" remain in Mississauga to be processed and to expect a wait time of under a year, this was just last week but today I received an e-mail from CIC stating that our application has been sent to London, UK. I'm very concerned! Has anyone else had such a thing happen? Why are some sent to London while other stay in Canada since the London office is so backlogged?!

Welcome! I am in Calgary so we are practically neighbours!

I have added you to the spreadsheet.

Why did you have your MP call? (Just curious)

The great and powerful SchnookoLoly maintains a FAQ on another immigration forum, please read this as it answers your question about why some applications go to Mississauga while others go to London.

It is not unheard of for applications to change visa offices, especially if the applicant moves to another country. That didn't happen in your case but I am just providing an example.

 

[SchnookoLoly]

Hi songbird82,

I started responding to the PM you sent me, which was pretty much verbatim of your post, then realised you'd also posted here, so I'll just respond here. (FYI, better to keep questions public - one, others can benefit from the answers, and two, my answers can be vetted by others - we don't get it right every time!)

Basically, Andrew's answer completely mirrors what I was going to say. The answer to the Mississauga/London thing is in the FAQ which Andrew has linked you to, so have a read of that and it should answer your question. In addition, the cover page on the spreadsheet has a big red box that also answers this question. (I'm running out of ways to make that box more obvious!)

I am also curious as to why you bothered to get your MP involved - I wouldn't get your MP to do anything else for you until you're at least one year into the process, there's no point otherwise.

And Andrew is correct, sometimes applications change visa offices. We don't know the reasons - none of us works for CIC! - but a few people have had their office change. My guess (and it's only my guess!) is that it has something to do with background checks that can't be done from outside of the UK. I know in Canada a handful of people get requests to have RCMP checks done while the vast majority do not, and this usually results in "ZOMG I AM FREAKING OUT WHY DO I NEED TO DO THIS I AM NOT A CRIMINAL IS CANADA GOING TO ARREST ME OMGOMGOMGOMGOMG *FLAIL*".... and it's usually because the standard background check came up as inconclusive, usually because of something simple like the applicant happens to share a name and birthday with someone who DOES have a criminal record in Canada, so they ask you to do an RCMP check which includes a fingerprint, then they can be sure you are who you say you are. It's not a big deal, it's just an extra wrinkle that takes an extra few weeks to iron out. I suspect - again, only my guess - that applications that start in Mississauga but get transferred to the UK after have something similar happen.

Finally, if you look at the spreadsheet, you can see that tons of people are processed in London from the get-go and not transferred... not everyone's applications stay in Canada. So just calm yourself and sit back and wait it out. Average for London for British applicants hasn't changed in the past 1.5ish years, it's been holding pretty steady at 8 months. The advertised 29 months is because of the applications from Islamabad. (This is also explained in detail on both the cover page of the spreadsheet and on the FAQ.)

Hope that helps.

 

[SchnookoLoly]

Hi Everyone

I'm looking for some help as I am so upset and angry with myself for what Ive received today and cannot get through to CIC for help.

Whilst sending my OUTLAND application I accidentally printed off the INLAND document checklist, but somehow managed to send the OUTLAND sponsored spouse questionnaire. So had a letter and my application sent back today asking for the correct form IMM5285 which is the inland form not the outland. After looking at the OUTLAND checklist I've now go to redo a few forms too

So now I don't know what to do. I wanted to go OUTLAND and be all done quicker but now I'm starting from scratch and the last 2 months have been a waste!! However if i send the application back as requested I should get an Open Work Permit in 4 months but PR would take 18m / 2yrs. I'm already in Canada as visitor and as I'm in Alberta I'm entitled to Healthcare and a Driving Licence now as my husband is a citizen.

I'm totally lost and just need some help if anyone has been in a similar situation...

Thank you so much

Follow rhcohen's advice, send in the correct outland forms and write a letter of explanation. It's not worth having your application stay inland because of the processing times, and no one knows if the actual 4-month work permit thing is going to happen in 4 months or not. I may also be mistaken on this next part but I believe the work permits are only for one year so there's also a question on whether the work permits will be able to be extended or not past the first year.

Good luck!

 

[rhcohen2014]

Follow rhcohen's advice, send in the correct outland forms and write a letter of explanation. It's not worth having your application stay inland because of the processing times, and no one knows if the actual 4-month work permit thing is going to happen in 4 months or not. I may also be mistaken on this next part but I believe the work permits are only for one year so there's also a question on whether the work permits will be able to be extended or not past the first year.

Good luck!

i think the work permits are 2 years. the pilot program itself is 1 year.

 

[SchnookoLoly]

i think the work permits are 2 years. the pilot program itself is 1 year.

I thought I had read that the OWPs were just for one year - bonus if it's for 2. Thanks for correcting me!

 

[rhcohen2014]

I thought I had read that the OWPs were just for one year - bonus if it's for 2. Thanks for correcting me!

and i thought it was for 2... perhaps i'm mistaken? def. don't quote me on it yet! i've sent a message to sophiee to see if she knows. i don't want to be passing around wrong information.

 

[songbird82]

Thank you SchnookoLoly and AndrewBrit for your replies. How helpful you are! Sorry about the private messages, I wasn't sure if my forum message would be seen. I'll keep things out here in the open from now on and hopefully others can benefit as well.
I had my MP call as I wanted clarification on if our application was to remain in Mississauga temporarily or permanently and wasn't able to teach the CIC by phone personally. I guess we panicked after seeing the 29 months in London and wanted to know if it was to be sent there or not. And it took over 100 days just for SA. My MP's office was able to speak to a CIC agent, who I couldn't reach by phone, and she was able to get clarification that our application was to remain in Mississauga. But then now a week later, I received a reply to an e-mail I sent to CIC asking this same question before my MP was involved and the reply stated that our application was initially to remain in Mississauga but it has now been sent to London. So I never received an official "letter" saying that our application as been sent to London. Know what I mean? Is it possible that I got misinformation from whoever replied to my e-mail thread?
I totally get why they're fielding applications and read that in the spreadsheet but I'm really disappointed ours didn't stay in Mississauga like they said as I feel like our application was pretty straight forward. My husband is a kiwi living in London, anyone else sponsor a New Zealand spouse? He already had all of his police checks (for UK, Australia and NZ where's he all lived).

Hi songbird82,

I started responding to the PM you sent me, which was pretty much verbatim of your post, then realised you'd also posted here, so I'll just respond here. (FYI, better to keep questions public - one, others can benefit from the answers, and two, my answers can be vetted by others - we don't get it right every time!)

Basically, Andrew's answer completely mirrors what I was going to say. The answer to the Mississauga/London thing is in the FAQ which Andrew has linked you to, so have a read of that and it should answer your question. In addition, the cover page on the spreadsheet has a big red box that also answers this question. (I'm running out of ways to make that box more obvious!)

I am also curious as to why you bothered to get your MP involved - I wouldn't get your MP to do anything else for you until you're at least one year into the process, there's no point otherwise.

And Andrew is correct, sometimes applications change visa offices. We don't know the reasons - none of us works for CIC! - but a few people have had their office change. My guess (and it's only my guess!) is that it has something to do with background checks that can't be done from outside of the UK. I know in Canada a handful of people get requests to have RCMP checks done while the vast majority do not, and this usually results in "ZOMG I AM FREAKING OUT WHY DO I NEED TO DO THIS I AM NOT A CRIMINAL IS CANADA GOING TO ARREST ME OMGOMGOMGOMGOMG *FLAIL*".... and it's usually because the standard background check came up as inconclusive, usually because of something simple like the applicant happens to share a name and birthday with someone who DOES have a criminal record in Canada, so they ask you to do an RCMP check which includes a fingerprint, then they can be sure you are who you say you are. It's not a big deal, it's just an extra wrinkle that takes an extra few weeks to iron out. I suspect - again, only my guess - that applications that start in Mississauga but get transferred to the UK after have something similar happen.

Finally, if you look at the spreadsheet, you can see that tons of people are processed in London from the get-go and not transferred... not everyone's applications stay in Canada. So just calm yourself and sit back and wait it out. Average for London for British applicants hasn't changed in the past 1.5ish years, it's been holding pretty steady at 8 months. The advertised 29 months is because of the applications from Islamabad. (This is also explained in detail on both the cover page of the spreadsheet and on the FAQ.)

Hope that helps.

 

[songbird82]

I know everyone here is in the same boat! But just seeing if anyone had the same thing happen, have their application transferred to London after it was initially said to be processed in Mississauga?

 

[SchnookoLoly]

I know everyone here is in the same boat! But just seeing if anyone had the same thing happen, have their application transferred to London after it was initially said to be processed in Mississauga?

You can find this information in the spreadsheet. You can also see in the spreadsheet that there are a handful of people who have "PA is Kiwi" or "PA is from New Zealand" in their notes column. Please use the spreadsheet for stuff like this, that's why it's there.

Honestly, with your other half having lived in so many places, that's probably why it was sent to London. Multiple places of residence just adds an extra layer of complexity to the application and my guess would be that some of the checks they have to do are easier to do out of London instead of Mississauga.

So just sit back and relax, your app is in London and you're probably in for an 8-9 month wait from when you applied.

 

[songbird82]

Thanks again for your reply. That's a good point about him having lived many places and having that add more complexity. So you'd guess 8-9 months from when they started processing our application on Feb. 18th, 2015? Or 8-9 months from when they received it on Dec. 1, 2014?

You can find this information in the spreadsheet. You can also see in the spreadsheet that there are a handful of people who have "PA is Kiwi" or "PA is from New Zealand" in their notes column. Please use the spreadsheet for stuff like this, that's why it's there.

Honestly, with your other half having lived in so many places, that's probably why it was sent to London. Multiple places of residence just adds an extra layer of complexity to the application and my guess would be that some of the checks they have to do are easier to do out of London instead of Mississauga.

So just sit back and relax, your app is in London and you're probably in for an 8-9 month wait from when you applied.

 

[SchnookoLoly]

Received. So 8-9 from when you applied, though your sponsor approval was slightly longer so might be more like 9-10.