The Escapea

From my experiences I would say that NZ is the best system; you submit an 'Expression of Interst' which is reviewed, and if you have enough points automatically selected from the 'pool'. These selections take place every 2 weeks! (No hanging around!). If selected from the pool, you are immediately invited to apply for PR. Dead quick, and no messing. They recently increased the points reqd. to 140 though, and also the time until citizenship to 5 years (from 2 yrs). They are also the most helpful, friendly and least bureaucratic immigration people I've ever spoken to!

Australia is also pretty quick - about 6 months to get PR once you've submitted; but they make you jump through hoops to get the info to submit - like getting a skills assessment to prove you are actually in the profession you say you are! Then it's 2 years to citizenship. They are not particularly helpful though (unless you manage to get to a immigration dept office in Australia and speak to a 'real person'!).

Canada seems to be about the worst in terms of timescales and bureaucracy

Someone remind me again why we decided on Canada and not the other two...?!!!

mctunes

Thanks for this. It's just what I was looking for.

Mike.

kt0157

No doubt you then get done for fraud if you fail to use your real name, but you can never use your real name because it never agrees with the SIN card.

What does it matter that it doesn't match your PR card anyway? Not everyone with a SIN card has a PR card. I blame the woman with the correcting fluid..

K.

woofwoof

Two people from where I work have left for Oz, one flew out yesterday and one went about a year and a half ago. One was on a skilled worker type thing and the other was a system where you had to buy a business/franchise and hire an aussie, or something like that.

They both didn't have any bother going through there separate processes and they couldn't believe what was happening with our application/process. One of the major differences, that i think all of us attempting to get to Canada really need, was the communication with the the embassy's. The one who flew out yesterday was in regular contact with Aus and asked them if it was okay to come to Aus a few weeks after his official day when he should have been there. They said that was fine!!!!!!!!!!!!! as long as it wasn't too far after the deadline date. He couldn't understand why my jaw dropped to the floor in sheer disbelief of how flexible the Aussies where. He thought I was kidding about how we where allowed to communicate with the chc and then pray for a response, worrying all the time if they would put our case to the bottom of the pile. It was only a phone call to him, to me it was a miracle. I saw these guys through the whole of their process and I can say I was completely jealous. If there's a time I wish the chc would communicate with us its now. We are not going to be able to get our medical results to the chc within the 90 days they've allowed. If they don't read and accept our email explanation of why then its goodnight from us. There is know way the Aussies would ignore you in this situation. The guys who left for Aussie occasionally had to communicate with the embassy and all there issues where sorted in a matter of minutes.

MarkG

I still think the basic problem is that the Australian and New Zealand governments are serious about immigration to benefit their economy, whereas the Canadian government mostly see it as a way to buy votes.

kt0157

Oh, yeah, 'coz you'd never find Oz Immigration being sticklers for rules. Oh wait.

This poor woman has a body mass index that falls outside the "normal" range. Oh dear. She's automatically failed the medical and being DEPORTED (and forced to leave her Aussie husband and family behind).

K.

The Escapea

It was the NZ immigration that I said was helpful & non-bureaucratic - certainly not the Aussie one! Their immigration dept. seem to be on a par (if not worse!) with the Canadians for having rules for rules sake, and then sticking to them!

MarkG

I also got a letter last month saying April 2007. I also got another letter today saying June 2007.

This is now getting totally absurd.

SkiBum

Hard to believe - I was sure the first one was an error - MarkG what is your timeline?

urbanproject

Hi,

Even though NZ Immigration time scales have lengthened quite a bit, I agree with the above post about friendliness and being approachable. Can't speak for Australia or Canada as I'm not familiar with the process, apart from reading posts here. I suppose every country deals with immigration systems differently.

When my file was allocated to a NZ Case officer, I had a direct phone line to speak to him and he did answer pretty much all my questions, either by phone or email. When I was approved 7 weeks later, he insisted on meeting me when I said I'd pick my passport up and gave me lots of advice in person for when I got to NZ.

Fingers crossed all of you will hear soon,

Jen

Craftybanshee

Cool!

MarkG

November 2004 AoR.

I'd guess the letter is bogus too, as it says they're currently assessing applications from November 2004, which is obviously wrong since no-one past July 2004 has said they got medical requests. Hopefully their computer has just screwed up and sent the letters to the wrong people.

I think I'll email them and see if I get any kind of response.

SkiBum

It sounds that way. It's interesting that it states they are currently processing November 2004 - maybe these letters are being prepared in advance as they expect that by time they get to Nov 2004 submissions to need to send out more letters? Having said that, the originator of this thread refers to a second letter that is identical in every respect to his April 2007 letter, except for a new date of June 2007.

The most likely is that it is a computer error, but definitely worth following up on....Good luck with that.

Joel

Hello again

Thanks to all the people that replied.

Upon closer inspection of the second letter, it does say "At the present time, we are assessing applications submitted in November of 2004". In the first one it said April 2004.

My sister and her husband have also applied. They submitted 20/06/04, AOR 31/07/04. They haven't recieved any communication from CIC at all.

I think I will drop them an email. I'll let you all know if they reply.

It'll happen one day folks................................

Alan2005

We early November 04 AOR and are in the same position (got the April 07 letter a while back and the June 07 letter on Friday).

Can't say I'm convinced by the computer error theory, reckon they are just getting slower by the day ... bah!

Will be interesting to see what they have to say for themselves.