What Are My Rights When My Citizenship Application is Delayed?

[harith86]

Hello,

I sent my application for citizenship grant on September 30th 2020.. And in my tracker it shows that application was filed on January 21st 2021.

Nothing happened until July 2022, and that's when I received an invitation for a test after many follow up attempts, and my MP follow-ups as well. I did the test and it turned green on tracker.

Then I was asked to do fingerprints in Nov 2022, and then after a week background verification only turned green.

Then I was asked to come for an interview in Feb 2023, and up until now, nothing turned green, was am hoping to get an oath soon, but nothing is happening and even I called today, and IRCC agent said it's still in process so you need to wait.

What are my rights here? How do I get this expedited? what else can I do? I am pushing on them in every step of the way to make something progress, but I am tired of this and I need to know my rights and how can I finish this once and for all?

IRCC office: Montreal

Thank you,

 

[dpenabill]

Hello,

I sent my application for citizenship grant on September 30th 2020.. And in my tracker it shows that application was filed on January 21st 2021.

Nothing happened until July 2022, and that's when I received an invitation for a test after many follow up attempts, and my MP follow-ups as well. I did the test and it turned green on tracker.

Then I was asked to do fingerprints in Nov 2022, and then after a week background verification only turned green.

Then I was asked to come for an interview in Feb 2023, and up until now, nothing turned green, was am hoping to get an oath soon, but nothing is happening and even I called today, and IRCC agent said it's still in process so you need to wait.

What are my rights here? How do I get this expedited? what else can I do? I am pushing on them in every step of the way to make something progress, but I am tired of this and I need to know my rights and how can I finish this once and for all?

IRCC office: Montreal

Thank you,

Political activism is one option. Both in terms of advocacy aimed at IRCC processing citizenship applications generally, and in terms of engaging in personal efforts to encourage IRCC in an individual case. It appears you are familiar with the latter, including pursuing one of the more common approaches, that of contacting your MP.

In terms of fundamental rights, legal recourse is very limited. Actually there is virtually no legal recourse unless IRCC's conduct amounts to a de facto denial of the application, such as where processing does not progress for so long, and in such circumstances, that a court would conclude IRCC is in effect refusing to process the application.

Note that the right to fair procedure is rather limited relative to how long IRCC takes to process an application. Delays, even lengthy delays, are not sufficient to establish a breach of procedural fairness.

If IRCC declines or refuses to process an application, mandamus may be available to compel IRCC to proceed with processing the application. While some have succeeded without a lawyer, this procedure more or less requires the assistance of a competent lawyer (meaning, among other things, an expensive lawyer) to have any chance of succeeding.

However, since you just had an interview in the previous month, it is readily apparent that IRCC is in fact processing your application. So a court order (mandamus) that IRCC process your application is not available. And even if it was, the Federal Court would not order IRCC to do any more, any faster, than what it appears IRCC is currently doing.

 

[Smsm73]

mandamus

 

[sdqyul]

Hello,

I sent my application for citizenship grant on September 30th 2020.. And in my tracker it shows that application was filed on January 21st 2021.

Nothing happened until July 2022, and that's when I received an invitation for a test after many follow up attempts, and my MP follow-ups as well. I did the test and it turned green on tracker.

Then I was asked to do fingerprints in Nov 2022, and then after a week background verification only turned green.

Then I was asked to come for an interview in Feb 2023, and up until now, nothing turned green, was am hoping to get an oath soon, but nothing is happening and even I called today, and IRCC agent said it's still in process so you need to wait.

What are my rights here? How do I get this expedited? what else can I do? I am pushing on them in every step of the way to make something progress, but I am tired of this and I need to know my rights and how can I finish this once and for all?

IRCC office: Montreal

Thank you,

Hi, can you please tell me where can you do the fingerprints in Montreal?

 

[harith86]

Hi, can you please tell me where can you do the fingerprints in Montreal?

I'm in south shore of Montreal so I did them in Longueuil

 

[rmtl]

Hi, can you please tell me where can you do the fingerprints in Montreal?

I did them here https://nationalpardon.org/pardon-centre-in-montreal/

 

[i6evx5e8]

Not possible to force IRCC. Not at least in your case.

 

[bas12]

I am also wondering about the same thing.
I am June 2021 applicant.
Thinking about withdrawing and reapplying, but it would be good to find out if my application was flagged for something, or just abandoned, as they seem to do with applications that are not finalized in one year.
At least I'd know if I will get stuck again when I reapply.

So far I managed to extract very little information out of them.
There is something about level 2 processing and a review by a PM03 officer with a deadline of April 1 in GCMS notes, but it is not clear what is going on, and if this is something to be concerned about. The deadline was missed anyway, so I guess it didn't mean anything.

Of course the representative on the phone doesn't know anything other than that it is being processed, they don't need any documents from me and there is nothing to worry about, and responses to webforms are absolutely useless.

 

[zagcollins]

Political activism is one option. Both in terms of advocacy aimed at IRCC processing citizenship applications generally, and in terms of engaging in personal efforts to encourage IRCC in an individual case. It appears you are familiar with the latter, including pursuing one of the more common approaches, that of contacting your MP.

In terms of fundamental rights, legal recourse is very limited. Actually there is virtually no legal recourse unless IRCC's conduct amounts to a de facto denial of the application, such as where processing does not progress for so long, and in such circumstances, that a court would conclude IRCC is in effect refusing to process the application.

Note that the right to fair procedure is rather limited relative to how long IRCC takes to process an application. Delays, even lengthy delays, are not sufficient to establish a breach of procedural fairness.

If IRCC declines or refuses to process an application, mandamus may be available to compel IRCC to proceed with processing the application. While some have succeeded without a lawyer, this procedure more or less requires the assistance of a competent lawyer (meaning, among other things, an expensive lawyer) to have any chance of succeeding.

However, since you just had an interview in the previous month, it is readily apparent that IRCC is in fact processing your application. So a court order (mandamus) that IRCC process your application is not available. And even if it was, the Federal Court would not order IRCC to do any more, any faster, than what it appears IRCC is currently doing.

cudda just said you're screwed.

 

[bas12]

Get a lawyer and file a mandamus. That's the only way to get them to do anything.

That's something I was planning to look into, but now I wonder if reapplying wouldn't be both quicker and cheaper. Mandamus process also tends to drag for months.

 

[johnjkjk]

I am also wondering about the same thing.
I am June 2021 applicant.
Thinking about withdrawing and reapplying, but it would be good to find out if my application was flagged for something, or just abandoned, as they seem to do with applications that are not finalized in one year.
At least I'd know if I will get stuck again when I reapply.

So far I managed to extract very little information out of them.
There is something about level 2 processing and a review by a PM03 officer with a deadline of April 1 in GCMS notes, but it is not clear what is going on, and if this is something to be concerned about. The deadline was missed anyway, so I guess it didn't mean anything.

Of course the representative on the phone doesn't know anything other than that it is being processed, they don't need any documents from me and there is nothing to worry about, and responses to webforms are absolutely useless.

Files do rarely fall between the cracks. But most likely it's in a review queue and if you resubmit it will end up at (the end of) that queue again.

When was the last update on your notes (look for every date)?

 

[bas12]

Files do rarely fall between the cracks. But most likely it's in a review queue and if you resubmit it will end up at (the end of) that queue again.

When was the last update on your notes (look for every date)?

2023/02/02 referred from L1 to L2
before that
2022/09/28 client details updated. I don't know what this is, I requested an address change and sent a travel notification in May, so maybe they only just got to it in September. I remember receiving some weird response to the travel notification from them about prioritizing applications from people who do not have covid travel restrictions about a week earlier.
The next things before that and the last tracker update is 2022/03/01 for the test completion.

If I knew more about what's going on, it would be easier to chose the best strategy.
Maybe it is flagged because I didn't have a job and permanent housing for a few months after landing. If I reapply now, it might not matter, since by now I have more than enough days even if they don't count the first few months.
Actually, if I reapply in September, these temporary sublets and airbnbs wouldn't even be a part of the time interval for which they check residency requirements.

Maybe it is just because of that travel notification they didn't finish it in 12 months, so there is no incentive for them to work on it if they are evaluated on how many applications they finalize in 12 months. So, I might actually get it done in 6 months this time.

 

[mimi2303]

Hello,

I sent my application for citizenship grant on September 30th 2020.. And in my tracker it shows that application was filed on January 21st 2021.

Nothing happened until July 2022, and that's when I received an invitation for a test after many follow up attempts, and my MP follow-ups as well. I did the test and it turned green on tracker.

Then I was asked to do fingerprints in Nov 2022, and then after a week background verification only turned green.

Then I was asked to come for an interview in Feb 2023, and up until now, nothing turned green, was am hoping to get an oath soon, but nothing is happening and even I called today, and IRCC agent said it's still in process so you need to wait.

What are my rights here? How do I get this expedited? what else can I do? I am pushing on them in every step of the way to make something progress, but I am tired of this and I need to know my rights and how can I finish this once and for all?

IRCC office: Montreal

Thank you,

Hi, I have almost same timelibe. I applied Dec 2020, everything turned green Feb 2023, so far nothing, not even Decision made

 

[kbanks007]

I'm also in this boat. I applied February, 2021, and I wrote the test in April, 2022. Ever since then, there has been no updates. NOTHING at all. MP has raised 2 emails on my behalf and still nothing. It's quite weakening. Test and Background have been completed for over a year now. At this point, I am confused.

 

[mimi2303]

I'm also in this boat. I applied February, 2021, and I wrote the test in April, 2022. Ever since then, there has been no updates. NOTHING at all. MP has raised 2 emails on my behalf and still nothing. It's quite weakening. Test and Background have been completed for over a year now. At this point, I am confused.

At this point I am lost, honestly..waiting for another how many years, months..my MP..his office got in youth with IRCC, but as I mentioned, with absolutely no result.