Congrats with test! What's your timeline (applied, in process)? I did test/interview end of November and posted it on
another forum, below is a copy.
Ok, did my test/interview at 1025 Rue Saint-Jacques today. Took little more than 1 hour for the whole process. At the entrance you show invitation paper and attendant let you in. Everybody were gathering in a waiting room with the seats until it was the time printed on invitation. There were 70-80 people in total. Then agent came and folks over 55 were invited to a "ceremony room" to do interviews with the agents, they were called by their names. Everybody else proceeded to a test room.
Test was very easy-- I didn't have any dates at all and one question with the names I had was something about Sir John A. Macdonald, what can be simpler? The level of difficulty of question is on the same level as on training websites, i.e. nothing tricky and sophisticated. The study booklet can obviously be used to produce much more difficult questions that are in the current versions of a test.
When you complete the test, you put booklet with questions with answer sheet in a basket and proceed directly to the "ceremony room". By the time people were starting to finish their tests, agents in the "ceremony room" were finishing interviewing people over 55. There was no delay, i.e. we didn't have to wait for everybody to complete their tests to queue up for an interview.
Somebody was bringing up applicants' cases in folders with checked answer sheets to the "ceremony room" and putting them into baskets of interviewing agents. There were total of 4 agents in this room doing interviews, plus another one who was interviewing in another room, because there were not enough tables in front for 5 people in that room. Agents were taking cases from baskets and calling up the applicants. Organizers tried to sit applicants as far as possible from the interviewers, so it'd be not so easy to hear the interview dialogs.
I'm under impression that interviewing people had nothing to do with your case directly before an interview, i.e. they were not specifically designated to do your interview. One interviewer just took several cases from another one when he ran out of cases from his own basket.
I wouldn't say all interviews were especially short, at least not for everyone, some people were questioned for 10, maybe even 15 minutes. One interviewer was asking someone about different periods of time in Canada and was pretty thorough.
My interview was rather short and lasted for about 5 minutes. Agent asked for ID's (PR, health card and drivers license), copies of bio-pages of current passport and passport related to a 4-year period, also asked to show a COPR original and provide copy of a COPR. Agent had a checklist form with lots of items on that list, maybe about 15-20, each of them had a checkbox and a comment field related to a specific question. So, when doing interview an agent would tick a checkbox and/or write something in a comment field. Basically, agent is filling "Part B - Inverview" part of a File Requirements Checklist (see
here) while conducting interview and resolving additional questions, if any.
The interviewer went through the passport stamps and compared them with a residence calculator printout while ticking the in and out dates that were matching stamps in passport. I had all the stamps matching trips, so there was no problem. Also, the agent refused to use my reference table with trips/stamps I had prepared for interview.
Other questions that were asked:
1. How long have you been living in Canada?
2. When was the last time you traveled out of Canada and for how long? Checked the stamps in a new passport.
3. When you got your PR? (I've got PR after living in Canada for several years).
4. What do you do and where do you work?
5. What company is doing and where it's located?
6. How long have you been working there? (a comment like "same employer" was made in a checklist and some box ticked).
7. Then I was asked about unemployment period (I also noticed that there were big questions and some handwriting in my original application form in a red ink, seemed like around a section related to employment, but I'm not sure 100%). I explained that I moved from one province to another without having a job and then found a job there.
8. What's your current address?
9. Do you rent or do you own?
10. Have you ever had problems with the police anywhere?
11. Have you marital and family status changed since application?
12. Was your new passport issued in Canada?
That's it, as far as I can remember. I didn't get and RQ or anything and was informed that if judge approves the case, oath will be in around 2-4 months after test date. While on my way out I noticed another group of people gathering in a waiting room, so probably they do tests for 2-3 groups a day.
* * *
One other thing I noticed I'd mention that may be related to interview or maybe not. Somebody was checking my LinkedIn account as anonymous user 2 hours before test and between 2-3 weeks ago, right around time when I received test notification or notification could be issued. I thought that was unusual-- 1st, I don't remember anonymous users checking my profile before, second, timing seems suspicious to me. So, maybe it's CIC "googling". Here's how it looked when I got back from the test:
LinkedIn member
This member chose to be shown as anonymous
2 hours ago
LinkedIn member
This member chose to be shown as anonymous
2 weeks ago
I didn't know that somebody could peek on your profile in LinkedIn while remaining completely anonymous (and that's actually feature of this service, as it turns out) and I don't like it. I found there's lots of discontent about this feature among users of this site-- it was supposed to be a professional network site based on openness, instead they allow groups who want to remain secretive peek on you without going for any lengths whatsoever. Seems there's no way to disable this feature for own profile either. I'm disappointed in this service.
