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So we bought our tickets. I do have to say our case was unique, don't feel frustrated if you have been waiting longer than us.

Best of luck to everyone. <3

Application Received: March 8th
AOR1: April 7th
Sponsor Approval: April 25th
Medical Request: April 26th
Biometrics Request: May 1st
Medical Passed: May 4th
File Transferred to Warsaw: May 13th
AOR2: June 7th
eCAS shows 'We started processing your application...': September 5th
Ghost Update : November 27th
Decision Made/Pre-arrival letter : November 27th
PPR : December 2nd
Arrival : December 25th
 
So we bought our tickets. I do have to say our case was unique, don't feel frustrated if you have been waiting longer than us.

Best of luck to everyone. <3

Application Received: March 8th
AOR1: April 7th
Sponsor Approval: April 25th
Medical Request: April 26th
Biometrics Request: May 1st
Medical Passed: May 4th
File Transferred to Warsaw: May 13th
AOR2: June 7th
eCAS shows 'We started processing your application...': September 5th
Ghost Update : November 27th
Decision Made/Pre-arrival letter : November 27th
PPR : December 2nd
Arrival : December 25th
Arrival on Christmas :) fairytale ;)
 
At last. I was expecting another daily nagging call with VFS today, but I just got a call from the courier, who said he was coming in about 20 minutes to drop off the docs. Honestly, after all the ways VFS disappointed me, I was half expecting to receive "someone else's documents" haha. But no, everything is there, everything is correct, no errors. I shall be calling the husband later on to decide on when to fly over :D Wooooo!

Took almost a month with VFS. It would have been 4 weeks tomorrow...
 
At last. I was expecting another daily nagging call with VFS today, but I just got a call from the courier, who said he was coming in about 20 minutes to drop off the docs. Honestly, after all the ways VFS disappointed me, I was half expecting to receive "someone else's documents" haha. But no, everything is there, everything is correct, no errors. I shall be calling the husband later on to decide on when to fly over :D Wooooo!

Took almost a month with VFS. It would have been 4 weeks tomorrow...

A month is quite long. You said above your case was unique - in what way? (obviously if this is not too personal a question)
 
A month is quite long. You said above your case was unique - in what way? (obviously if this is not too personal a question)
It was Ramin F, who said their case was unique :) Ours was as common and typical as the come: no kids, no medical/legal/criminal complications, no divorces, nothing. Maybe the age difference (husband sponsor is 8-9 years older than me), but other than that - typical case.

I think my case just "got lost" at the VFS office, because I seem to be the only one (or one of the very few) people who had to wait longer than 7-10 business days to get my documents back. That is even if you don't take the courier service into account. It took them 3 weeks to call me to say my passport is ready.
 
It was Ramin F, who said their case was unique :) Ours was as common and typical as the come: no kids, no medical/legal/criminal complications, no divorces, nothing. Maybe the age difference (husband sponsor is 8-9 years older than me), but other than that - typical case.

I think my case just "got lost" at the VFS office, because I seem to be the only one (or one of the very few) people who had to wait longer than 7-10 business days to get my documents back. That is even if you don't take the courier service into account. It took them 3 weeks to call me to say my passport is ready.

Ah, thanks, I got the posts mixed up. Sorry to hear about your delays at visa office, it does happen.

I don't know what issues or matters are unique - apart from I suppose medical.

Although we have kids and prior divorces, we've been together long enough I don't think that's going to be an issue in our case - and no medical or criminal complications, either.

The part that does concern me is how long the security/background check may take. My spouse long ago worked for the Russian government - although not in a high-ranking or sensitive position. And her current job - for a very reputable organisation - involves a lot of travel, although not to any particularly sensitive countries or war zones or anything like that.

On the other hand, she's had Canadian visas continuously for five years or more, and most recently was given a ten year visitor's visa (max based on validity of passport). Lots of visas to other friendly countries. I guess that means she's been checked before.

So I hope it all balances out and the case won't be considered that unique, but assume it mostly depends on how detailed checks they do and 'partner agencies' and their response times rather than the substance of our case.

We're not incredibly sensitive about timing of our case, but truly hope it won't drag on past the summer.
 
Ah, thanks, I got the posts mixed up. Sorry to hear about your delays at visa office, it does happen.

I don't know what issues or matters are unique - apart from I suppose medical.

Although we have kids and prior divorces, we've been together long enough I don't think that's going to be an issue in our case - and no medical or criminal complications, either.

The part that does concern me is how long the security/background check may take. My spouse long ago worked for the Russian government - although not in a high-ranking or sensitive position. And her current job - for a very reputable organisation - involves a lot of travel, although not to any particularly sensitive countries or war zones or anything like that.

On the other hand, she's had Canadian visas continuously for five years or more, and most recently was given a ten year visitor's visa (max based on validity of passport). Lots of visas to other friendly countries. I guess that means she's been checked before.

So I hope it all balances out and the case won't be considered that unique, but assume it mostly depends on how detailed checks they do and 'partner agencies' and their response times rather than the substance of our case.

We're not incredibly sensitive about timing of our case, but truly hope it won't drag on past the summer.

What's your timeline? Hope your app gets processed quickly :D
 
What's your timeline? Hope your app gets processed quickly :D

Thank you. Submitted early october, aor1 sponsor approval and bio/med request all late november. Bio and med completed, waiting for med to show up in system. Letter re transfer to warsaw end of last week.

GCKey shows no interview needed, background check started, no docs needed, review of eligibility ongoing too.

I've tried to get a sense of how long warsaw files are taking, and the answer seems to be 'longer'. We'll just have to wait and see. Can't help but worry though.
 
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Thank you. Submitted early october, aor1 sponsor approval and bio/med request all late november. Bio and med completed, waiting for med to show up in system. Letter re transfer to warsaw end of last week.

GCKey shows no interview needed, background check started, no docs needed, review of eligibility ongoing too.

I've tried to get a sense of how long warsaw files are taking, and the answer seems to be 'longer'. We'll just have to wait and see. Can't help but worry though.
In terms of a timeline based on what I've seen in the past two months, it now takes 6-9 months for Warsaw to process (meaning from received by Sidney date to DM). They've expedited a lot recently with May applications being approved in November, but you never know if this trend will continue.
 
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GCKey shows no interview needed, background check started, no docs needed, review of eligibility ongoing too.
And as for GCKey, you know, ours showed "You don't need an interview" all the time even after we really got an interview request. And it never said anything else until the interview happened, and the status from "don't need" changed to "passed". So it's not a very reliable source of information :D
 
And as for GCKey, you know, ours showed "You don't need an interview" all the time even after we really got an interview request. And it never said anything else until the interview happened, and the status from "don't need" changed to "passed". So it's not a very reliable source of information :D

Thanks, that's true. Ours also showed current biometric (from existing visitor visas) and 'no biometric required' even after we received a biometric request.

I understand they've changed/are changing some rules on that, so I guess just normal system confusion.