Paulmccarthy

Hi guys,

my common law partner and I applied for permanent residence via FSW last year, we done so with the help of Brazolot who despite the large amount of bad reviews have pretty much done what they told us they would. We paid a lot of money which we were prepared for to help us achieve the best possible application.

My girlfriend, who is the main applicant, has a degree BSC in food bio-science and I have a trade behind me with 6 years experience in the gas industry. We are both 25 now, 24 at the time. I have well established family in Vancouver who are going to put us up and everything else we need but at the time of the application Brazolot advised us to apply for Toronto because of the opportunities, job wise, would aid the application.

Our application was forwarded onto the London embassy and they received it on 17/10/14. Checking our progress frequently on the CIC website and it still tells us in process, we were advised about 24 weeks to hear for medicals if they were to come.... its been around 31 weeks since that now.

can anyone tell me if this is a positive or a negative... or business as usual, things going at a snails pace? literally thinking about it everyday worrying

anybody with similar stories or have questions about our application process more than happy to help, just ask away

christmasoompa

Who told you it would be 24 weeks? That sounds ludicrously optimistic to me! According to CIC, current processing times for FSW via London are 31 months, so I really wouldn't worry yet and think you've still got quite a wait ahead of you going on that.

Incidentally, your choice of location on your app has absolutely no bearing on your application, so Brazolot gave you duff info there. It's simply for statistical info gathering.

HTH.

christmasoompa

P.S. Forgot to say, but just in case you're not aware, 'In Process' doesn't actually mean your app is in process (bizarrely!), it just means it's sitting in the queue waiting to be opened.

When it changes to 'we started processing your application on xxxx date' it's actually been looked at.

HTH.

Paulmccarthy

Christ. I thought the FSW application was a way around the general permanent residence 31 month wait no ? quelle surprise, our Brazolot migration case worker told us around 24 weeks we would hear word about our medicals then obviously it would take quite a few months after that to sort out what comes next.

I wont lie i'm extremely gutted with the possibility that it will be 31 months from oct 2014... we were sold the idea that it would take around 9 months once the application was in. Is there definitely no sort of fast track FSW application process no ?

Paulmccarthy

ahh yeah I only recently discovered this myself actually ! more disheartening news hopefully it somehow makes its way to the front of the pile, wont hold my breath but !

christmasoompa

A FSW application is a general PR application. That's what you've applied for, PR.

There is now, as all FSW applications are processed under the new 'Express Entry' which is processing apps in 6 months or so. But you applied before those changes, so I'm afraid your processing time will be longer. You can keep an eye on processing times on the CIC website here - Processing times for federal skilled worker applications

HTH.

christmasoompa

There's no way of 'queue jumping', you just have to wait your turn I'm afraid.

The only way to get there sooner is to go via a different visa route, such as a Temp Work Permit.

Good luck.

Paulmccarthy

My relatives in Vancouver own a landscaping company, could I apply for a temp work permit with a job offer from their company ? i have read a wee bit about all this LMO stuff and know thats not going to help me in this case but surely having somewhere to stay and working can get me a temp work permit no ? or am i just clutching at straws now

christmasoompa

Having somewhere to stay has absolutely no bearing on any visa app, but if it's a genuine job offer and you can get a LMIA (the new name for LMOs), then yes, you could get a TWP.

clareylou

Our story might give you some hope. We met with Brazalot some years ago, but gave him a wide berth after we caught him trying to secretly record our conversation. He gave me the creeps in general (a quick Google search told me I was right) and didn't really offer anything I couldn't easily achieve myself - ie no magic wand to suddenly put my job on the list. He wanted £8000 for the privilege too!

Jump to 2014, and my job suddenly reappears on the list. We apply in October UNDER FSW (twice, since the Royal Mail send our first application to Sydney Australia, where we are told it will take 90 days to arrive by sea, either back to the UK, or possibly Canada) DHL get our second application to Nova Scotia at the end of October, Australia Post get the first one there ten days later!

We phone the credit card company to alert them to the possibility of a duplicate transaction and are reassured that it wouldn't be authorised.

On Feb 14th, we get a text from the credit card company to say they have declined a possibly fraudulent transaction from CIC Canada. We phone and are told that they should retry in 10 mins, but our forum search indicates that CIC rarely try again and simply send the application back to you. But, hey, we have the second application waiting in the wings, so are confident. Two days later our credit card shows two fees have been taken within 10 mins of each other and we receive email confirmation of two application being processed under one client ID.

So, we are nearly a grand down, but decide not to meddle since so much rides on this application. We settle in for a long wait (by now processing times have jumped fro 27 months to 34 months), only to receive an email on April 23rd asking us to arrange medicals and send updated info sheets and pay Right Of Permanent Residence Fee. In all, about 27 weeks from receipt of application to request for medicals.

So after all the trauma, we finally seem to have some luck in terms of the speed things are going. Not sure how it's happened really. Hope it gives you a little glimmer of hope though.

Best of luck.

pennydog

We are in the same boat but we did go with Brazolot (I hadn't seen the negative stuff before we signed though). We were going to apply May 2013 but like you, my job wasn't on the list. Brazolot wanted the next payment but I told them no since they hadn't got any work to do for another year while we waited for the next list. After a bit of unpleasantness where I may have called him a conman in an email I got to hold payment off. Fast-forward to the May 14 list and my job is there. Our case officer wasn't Dennis Brazolot and is actually very pleasant to deal with, I can't fault him.

We finally got all of the paperwork together and sent off at the end of July. We heard back in February that they wanted our police checks and then we were asked for medicals and the right to permanent residency fee shortly after at the end of April. At no point did BMG mislead us into thinking it would be a short number of weeks, in fact we were told that the waiting time was currently 27 months and given a link to the CIC website. It's therefore astonished us that in under a year we have seemingly completed everything, so we're waiting with baited breath.

Aviator

Your relatives would have to be willing to shell out the $1000 application fee. ALso, if you have no experience or qualifications in landscaping, it is doubtful a LMIA application would be successful. It would also have to be proven that there are no locals (in Canada) able to or qualified to do the job.

If you were a highly qualified horticulturist with a lot of experience, it could be a different story.

CanadaGo

[QUOTE=Paulmccarthy;11655373]Hi guys,

Hi Paulmccarthy

I have read your story and just wish to share my story as well.
I am a London resident and have too applied under the fsw. My hubby being main applicany.File submitted December 2014.
I feel it's a very long wait and still haven't heard anything.
I emailed them once but just been asked to wait.
Others seems to be getting medical requests in 6 months or so. It's seems its very slow for London residents.
31 does seem a very long wait
We can network here if you hear anything ?

Paulmccarthy

[QUOTE=CanadaGo;11763325] Hi there, glad to share our story with you as I know how much it helps for what kind of timescale you are on.

We actually received word for our medicals in July. So we waited quite a while ! Since you handed yours in around december hopefully you wont be far behind, its really not easy waiting is it

emailing them will get you nothing but an automated response unfortunatly, also i constantly checked our application status to see if there was any movement, that is also a waste of time as ours still says processing application.

from what my lawyers tell me its nowhere near 31 months, i think its a bare minimum 9 anyway myself.

hope that helps some. any other questions just message on this thread.

Best of luck to you and your husband

Tigger1

As you're both under 30 have you looked into the IEC visa? I'm not sure how that would affect your PR application but it would give you an opportunity to possibly come earlier. Just a thought