First a bit of background history...

We originally moved to Canada from England in 1989 and lived here for three years before returning for England for personal reasons. Now we have returned once again. We are still classed as permanent residents, my mother and father both have social insurance numbers from the first time we lived here. However we have returned to Canada on the same immigration papers that were issued to us in 1989 where my brother and I were on my father's paper as we were only three and five at the time.

Now with the system having changed in the last fourteen years my brother and I have not been able to apply for our SIN numbers without our PR cards as we do not have our own landing numbers. Unfortunately it takes two months for the PR cards to arrive and then another month for our SIN numbers to arrive AFTER we have our PR cards.

All the information we've found on the official websites say we cannot work without an SIN however we've also been told by a worker at a Citizenship and Immigration Office that we can work despite not having our SIN's.

After all this we are very confused and want help from anyone who can give us an answer to our dilemma.

Please help us...we're so

May I suggest you post this in the Canadian Immigration forum towards the bottom of the forum listings.

Not sure how your PR status us still valid if you havent lived here since the early 90s, the usual 2 out of 5 year rule is clearly long since runout, anyway, back to the SIN issue.

Generally a company that wants to employ you can make provisions to make deductions as normal, without the actual SIN number, as long as you can show them a SIN number later.

Thats how it works for those of us who got jobs before sin numbers anyway.

If you can show you are legally entitled to work and are waiting to get the SIN number, most (not all) employers will settle for that. The reality is by the time they have decided they want to hire you and are asking about SIN numbers, the last thing an employer wants to do is start the searching proceedure again, so they will make allowances.

I'm not sure if I agree with that. Back in the days when I was looking for a job, SIN was one of the first things that came up in interviews.

<I thought this thread was about something a bit racier. Sorry. >

If it comes up early you just tell them that you're elligiable to work in canada and that the SIN number is on its way. Most employers are pretty reasonable. They may use it as an excuse for not hiring you if they werent going to do it anyway though I suppose.

No point at all staying at home waiting for it when you could be landing a job without it.

My husband got a job without his SIN number. When we landed he went to the HRDC office and told them he had a job and they fast tracked his application and he got his number in a couple of days. The actual card came about 3 weeks later.

Hth