Rose tea

Hi all,

Haven't logged in here for quite a while. I'm from the UK and I've been living in the US for the past 14 years. It's been a wonderful experience to live where I've lived, but it's become time to move on. It was such a massive undertaking that I said I wouldn't move internationally again: famous last words. After coming up with a shortlist of countries, spouse and I both agreed on Canada. We're hoping to be settled there two years from now (when we'll be late 30s/early 40s - hence our lower CRS scores). Current location preferences are Alberta and Nova Scotia, but we're open to most places except Toronto and Vancouver.

Plan 1 is Express Entry via FSW route. Issues: my US citizen husband is more employable than I am (tech sector) but has a CRS score in the low 400s. I have a high 400s score, but my career path is a little more open-ended (energy and environmental communications/higher education/technical writing/program management) and pays less than his field does. I've been out of work for months here in the US due to this issue.

Plan 2 is a work visa route: if my husband can get a year of Canadian work experience, his score goes up to the higher 400s. If I can get a job on a work visa around the same time, my score would be in the 500s after a year of Canadian work experience, and we'd just use me to apply for PR.

Plan 3 is to go the Atlantic Immigration Pilot route. Issues: I already live in a US state with a small, tourist-orientated economy, and it's a big part of why we're leaving. Many of the Nova Scotia tech employers aren't listed as designated employers, and who knows how willing they'd be to become one. I prefer working in the public sector, and I don't think any public sector places are designated or would become designated under the program, so we have that to think about. However, I suppose there's nothing stopping us, once we're permanent residents, from looking for work elsewhere in the country further down the line: is that correct? We'd like to make Nova Scotia work, of course: we have a young child who we don't want to uproot constantly.

That's about where we are at the moment after a few days of searching online and dragging myself back into the world of immigration. As soon as the COVID-19 situation is under control, we're going to take a road trip to Alberta and check it out. Nova Scotia is a bit too far for us though. I'm sure there's also plenty of immigration material to still read as well.

Happy to be back on the forums, and nervous but excited to be undertaking this! Would be happy to hear any feedback.

christmasoompa

Can't understand why you'd consider Plan 2 or 3 if you're scoring high 400's tbh! Your career prospects or salary have no relevance at all, once you've got PR you don't have to work in that field, or even work at all (you can retire, study etc). So that seems the obvious choice to me, no job offer required and the quickest and easiest way to PR by a mile.

Depends what you mean by 'further down the line'. You'll be committing to NS with a PNP app, they'll be sponsoring you for PR and if you upped sticks and moved after a month there, you'd be at risk of having your PR revoked for misrepresentation. However, if after a couple of years you decided to move on, then no problem at all.

HTH.

Rose tea

Thanks for the input here. To clarify, my high 400s score (and husband's lower 400s score) would be WITH a job offer: we wouldn't consider moving without at least one of us having work lined up. I realise now that's not in my original post and it's too late to edit it.

That leads into the second issue, which is that we have US-based debt (think car payment, student loans) which is manageable with US salaries, but which becomes steep once you convert it to $CAN. The more income the better really. We're taking the next two years to pay a lot of that down, but we can't take forever to do it due to our ages. I think I'm probably just projecting some of my worry here from being out of work and feeling unable to pitch in. So really it's an issue of our personal preference based on our circumstances, and not any legal barrier. Thanks for pointing that out.

Yes, definitely would be looking at years down the line as opposed to months. We'd like to be in NS for a while, if we went this route.

Again, thanks for the input and for helping me see this from a more technical perspective.

DigitalGhost

Getting work lined up is extremely difficult without already having a work permit. The best route is to normally sponsor your own PR as a highly skilled immigrant and then find a job, at which point you're no more difficult to hire than any Canadian.

Without one you're either going to need experience in a very high demand profession or an employer willing to do the necessary paperwork and wait for your arrival.

Rose tea

This is the part where I was having some confusion as I did research: how to get a job in the first place as someone not living in Canada. Is an employer really going to just hang on and wait around while you get your PR application ready? In the US, if they want you, they'll do the H-1B process for you, but that's all employer initiated anyway.

Husband's skills are very in demand, but mine not as much. Without job offers, our CRS scores are too low for admittance due to our age and lack of work experience in Canada. That would leave us with Plan 3 as the only option really.

DigitalGhost

Depends on the job and the part of Canada you want to go to. Some companies will, especially in the less populated provinces where the talent pool is smaller or if the job is very highly specialised in an area like tech or medicine.

What is your best CRS score without a job offer if you don't mind me asking?

Rose tea

We're looking at Alberta and Nova Scotia, but like I said, we're open to other places. Husband's field is tech. Even with a job offer though, he's at 420. With a provincial nomination, he'd be at over 1000. I still don't have a solid sense of how provincial nominations work. I read the info for the Alberta one and seemed to go in a circle: I wasn't clear on who started which part of it.

437 If I can score decently on the TCF, I could get it up to the mid or high 400s. Not saying that's doable for me, mind. But, unlike my age, it's at least possible to change.

DigitalGhost

437 is far from being terrible although it's obviously lower than the current draw thresholds.

The score for a PNP is largely just to make absolutely sure that you get picked tbh. There's no way of getting anywhere near that score without a nomination so it assures you go to the top of the virtual pile.

I've seen one employer who used to help their new foreign hires through the EE PR application process because at one point it was easier than getting a TWP for them and obviously offered more security.

Rose tea

Good to know. I'm also wondering how any of this will change in the post-Covid economy, which is the great unknown at the moment. I don't know how employers in Canada will feel over the next few years, but that's another thing out of our control. Alberta's oil industry will take a hit like ours has, I'm sure.

Lots to think about.

DigitalGhost

That's a question nobody outside of the Canadian government can answer slightly but if it helps, Canada is still inviting new immigrants to apply and in fact did an EE draw within the last 24 hours. It doesn't look like they're looking to shut the doors to new immigrants in the way that America has recently done. Quite the opposite in fact.

Rose tea

I suppose their population isn't suddenly going to grow massively, regardless of what the economy might or might not do, so that makes sense: unlike US immigration policy, which, as usual, makes no sense.

We'll start looking seriously at jobs north of the border next year and that will probably inform our next moves. Keeping an eye on the job market now as well, but it's hard to know what's representative of normal market at the moment.

Thanks for all the help so far.

DigitalGhost

You're very welcome. What I'd say is that if you're in that situation then maybe look at a couple of other provinces. Some of the provinces have special immigration pilots for tech professionals or do recruit from overseas and especially the US. For example, IBM and a few others have service centres and NOC's in Canada (the IT kind of NOC, not the Canadian government NOC) and I've seen them hold recruitment sessions in London, NYC and LA because a lot of the required skills and experience aren't available in the local workforce.

Rose tea

I didn't know about those! Thanks for the information, and we'll definitely look into it.

Siouxie

BC has a tech pilot https://www.welcomebc.ca/Immigrate-t...PNP-Tech-Pilot , the Eastern Provinces (including NS) have a drive for new immigrants - with designated employers potentially offering jobs - there's around 30 tech companies listed -
https://novascotiaimmigration.com/he...gration-pilot/
https://novascotiaimmigration.com/wp..._employers.pdf

However, you may be better to apply for EE using the higher scoring person and not being tied to a Province - it would also be potentially quicker to apply for EE without Provincial Nomination

Rose tea

Thanks for the info, and yes, you're right about taking a more unencumbered route. Time to brush up on my French, I think.