morning all..

after we put our emigration plans on hold for the last 18 months, I have been contacted by a consultancy in saskatoon offering to do visa application, paperwork ect and a lead for a company offering work. They have emailed me the costs and here is what they are offering:

1) payment of deposit $100.00

2) – upon completion of application and before submission $3,450.00

3) – when Permanent Residency Application is prepared and before submission $3,450.00

Application Fees – (must be paid when due, all amounts in Canadian funds) Application fees: Principal applicant $550.00, Spouse $550.00, Dependent Children $150.00 each
Right of Permanent Residency Fees: $490.00 for Principal applicant and spouse
Work permits: Principal applicant $150.00. Spouse $150.00 and study permits for Children under 18 $125.00 and if an extension of the work permit is required it will be the same cost as for the original work permit.
Apprenticeship fees – will vary according to province.

My question... is this a lot to pay? bearing in mind I am stacked out with work in the uk and don't have much time to sort application paperwork myself..

you dont need a consultant for the paper work, its straightforward with a little help from the people on this forum.

It is illegal for companies in canada to charge money to help find you work

You will have to provide the consultant all your life history and documents anyway, so why not do it yourself - its not that difficult, just takes some organising.

Plus the people on this Forum are very helpful.

Good luck!

Hi,

If your application is fairly straightforward it seems a lot of money to get someone else to fill in the forms and send them off for you! As the previous post states the forms are fairly straight forward and you have to find all the background documents and info yourself anyway There are lots of guidance notes on CIC website and you can ask any of us on here for help if you get stuck

Good Luck

$7 grand seems a fair chunk of change for what you will get, but its in line with other figures Ive seen. Plus it appears you have to pay them regardless of the outcome.

Bareing in mind you will likely end up doing all the donkey work gathering documentation, employment records, education records etc etc etc Im not convinced its worth it, not for a straightforward application.

There is a wiki regarding DIY vs hiring help, I suggest you give it a read
http://britishexpats.com/wiki/Catego...on_Consultants

save the money and use it for when you make the move, do sum organising and hard work now and it will be worth it in the end when you still have all that money that you may have wasted giving to a consultant who cannot guarantee you much to be honest.......nor can they speed up your application or get any special treatment and will make you do all the hardwork and get paid lots to not have done much and will probably make u get in touch with them for updates etc........

I agree that unless it's a complicated family, criminal or medical situation you might as well do it yourself.

No matter what you decide to do you WILL have to find the time to dig out all your education and work documents, figuring out dates and addresses etc. The consultant WONT do any of that for you. Then you'll simply fill in the forms. I know it can seem daunting when you first take a look but it really isn't that bad and why pay someone else to essentially fill in forms. As for the promise of finding work for you, hmmmmmm, we've all heard that one before. I'm afraid there's just no substitution to doing some leg work yourself.

Good luck

Hi Robinsons.
I agree with the other posters. Save your hard earned cash and do the application yourself.
We used Willisbrazolot&co immigration advisors at a cost of £6k.
Other than "helping" us to submit our application they've done nothing.
By "helping" I mean they told us what docs we needed and we spent 4 months running around to get them and paying for solicitors/notaries, etc, on top of that.
You will definitely need your money when you get to Canada.
I think you'd be better spending it on a reccie trip than filling some agent/solicitor's pockets.
Good luck. People on here will help you with any application questions you have.

thanks folks.. appreciate your comments

cheers

Jon

Hello Robinsons,
For what it's worth, we used Abrams & Krochak, I feel the same as Jimsan and others. They won't get your application processed any quicker than if you do it all yourself, which you more less have to do anyway.
As an example, we e-mailed yesterday to ask what options there are to getting a reponse from CIC as our medicals will expire in 4 months time. I fully expect the response to be exactly the same as the last time 5 weeks ago, they will e-mail CIC, who will say ' in process'.
Had we known about this website when we started out over 3 years ago,I'm pretty sure we'd have done it ourselves. Everybody else has been in the same situation as you are now, all the info you need is here, good luck.

Jimsan, just out of interest, did you deal with Dennis Brazalot ? The impression we got that he only was interested in taking on 'easy cases'.

Even then it is not that hard to do. A lot depend on how organised an applicant is and how detail oriented. Spend the time on the preparation and I can see no reason to pay someone else to fill in a few forms and tell you what to do, because bottom line is you still have to do it.

I agree with the above. Once I really put some time aside, the forms weren't as complex as I expected - it is the information that takes work & that you have to do anyway.

I was particulary uncertain on whether my role would meet the NOC 'list' and was having to make decisions in the uk on the basis of my potential to move to bc.
Rather than go as far as committing to a consultant for the whole application, I actually paid for a consult call with an immigration lawyer to get some advice, after they had reviewed my work history.

There were supposed to charge for an hour, but in the end it only took 20 mins, so instead they agreed to write up the conversation and only charged me half.

I suppose what I am saying is that even if you have a more complex situation, it might be worth a consult to advise first, before committing to larger fees for the entire application process.

And the advice from BE members is both good & almost instant in response.

Bali.

I did mine by myself--with lots of help from this forum--from filling-up the aplication forms to Landing. Some consultants, if you're lucky, will even lose your docs (see some threads here) and you'll be running short of time to meet CIC deadline. Yet, you're gonna pay them.. (some consultants).

Robinsons, just in case you're still not sure, we've just received a reply to our question from Abrams & Krochak about contacting them contacting CIC. 8 months after we took our medicals and still not having had the PPR, our lawyer's cunning plan is to do nothing, otherwise it could slow down the application proceedure !
You can see why you need to be qualified to be an immigration consultant, strategies like that don't come cheap, they come expensive !

I totally agree with lifeisajourney (and the name as well - it was part of our wedding vows) anyway.....

My company hired an immigration lawyer for us - she was bloody useless. Didn't tell me anything I didn't know, and you still have to do all the leg work of getting all the correct documents and providing them with the information that they just copy on to the form.

She caused us numerous dalays, I was always chasing her up, and she gave us some really bad advice regarding which route to go. So I actually spent more time double checking her work, and researching what she told us. In the end I sacked her and wished that I had had more confidence in myself to start with.

I have also heard horror stories on here about consultants / lawyers loosing paper work, not passing on medical requests etc. and some even holidng PPR etc. "hostage" until they get final payment up front.

The times I would get advice is if the case was at all complicated, e.g. complicated family, criminal or medical situation.

But I would only get advice and still do it all myself - I wouldn't hand my case over 100%.

I wouldn't fill out the form that allows them to act on your behalf and means that they get all your corresspondance (can't remember what it is called) as to me that is just adding a middleman.

Some consultants / lawyers will check over your package, forms and paperwork before you send it off which I think, if you are in any doubt might be benefical.