CANADA IMMIGRATION : FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Abrams & Krochak responds to all inquiries that are not addressed by our FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) page within one (1) business day. Business days in Canada are Monday to Friday, 09:00 to 17:00, Eastern Time. Please contact our office ONLY if your inquiry does not appear on our FAQ page and we have not acknowledged receipt of your communication within one (1) business day from the time of receipt.

Not only is e-mail the most expeditious and efficient form of communication but, also, if we have offered you a 100% money-back guarantee, we require a written record of ALL of our communications with you. If you insist upon communicating, using a means other than e-mail, we regret to inform you that our money-back guarantee will no longer apply.

Each and every piece of correspondence that we receive from you is stored by our firm in physical and electronic files in our office. To reduce confusion and expedite your case it is important that you include your file number and contact information on every correspondence to allow us to devote our full attention to working on your file, thereby achieving the best possible results for you and exceeding your expectations.

The legal assistants at Abrams & Krochak work under the supervision of Messrs. Abrams and Krochak. All incoming and outgoing e-mail is reviewed (and approved when outgoing) by either Mr. Abrams or Mr. Krochak.

Obtaining "permanent residence" or "permanent resident status" in Canada is also known as "immigrating to Canada" or becoming a "landed immigrant." The successful end result of the immigration process is the issuance of an immigrant visa. Persons to whom an immigrant visa has been issued must present themselves to an immigration officer at one of Canada's official ports of entry in order to become landed immigrants.

Canadian permanent residents/landed immigrants and citizens enjoy all of the same rights and privileges (i.e. free health care, free elementary and secondary education, etc.) with three (3) exceptions:

1. Permanent residents cannot vote;
2. Permanent residents cannot hold a Canadian passport; and
3. Permanent residents can be deported for certain criminal convictions.

Within any five (5) year period, a permanent resident must be:

physically present in Canada for at least 730 days (two (2) years) in that five (5) year period
OR
outside of Canada, accompanying a Canadian citizen, who is his or her spouse or common-law partner or a child accompanying a parent
OR
outside of Canada, employed on a full-time basis by a Canadian business
OR
an accompanying spouse, common-law partner or child of a permanent resident, who is outside Canada and is employed as a full-time basis by a Canadian business.

To be eligible to immigrate to Canada, one must meet the requirements of one (1) of three (3) classes of immigration: the Independent/Skilled Worker Class, the Family Class or the Business Class and apply for Permanent Residence in Canada through a Canadian visa office (i.e. High Commission/Embassy/Consulate).

Only after three (3) years of being a permanent resident/landed immigrant of Canada, is one eligible to apply for Citizenship.

We specialize in Applications for Temporary Visas and can assist you with your application for a Work Permit. Please review the information on our website pertaining to Work Permits.

We specialize in Applications for Temporary Visas and can assist you with your application for a Study Permit. Please review the information on our website pertaining to Study Permits.

We specialize in Applications for Temporary Visas and can assist you with your application for a Temporary Residence Visa (Visitor Visa). Please review the information on our website pertaining to Visitor Visas.

If you are interested in immigrating to Canada, we invite you to visit our Online Assessment Questionnaire, which is designed to enable our firm's team of lawyers to assess your qualifications for immigration to Canada in accordance with Citizenship and Immigration Canada's selection criteria, at no charge to you, usually within a few hours but no more than one (1) business day from the time that your Questionnaire is received. Business days in Canada are from 09:00 to 17:00, Eastern Time, Monday to Friday.

If Abrams & Krochak determines that we can assist you to immigrate to Canada, a member of our firm will provide you with a detailed breakdown of Abrams & Krochak's fees and services, via e-mail.

All those completing our free elegibility assessment online will receive a response. In many cases we may have incorrect information or the response may have been filtered into your Junk/Bulk Mail folder.(if applicable) Please check this before you contact us.

Please note that your qualifications have been personally assessed by a lawyer of this firm and, despite the speed of our evaluation, we wish to assure you that our e-mail is not an automated response. A lawyer of this firm reviews and assesses all incoming Online Assessment Questionnaires within one (1) business day, fifty-two (52) weeks per year.

If you would like your qualifications for immigration to Canada assessed by our firm, we wish to advise you that we do not assess qualifications on the basis of a curriculum vitae/résumé. To have your qualifications assessed by our firm, please fill out our Online Assessment Questionnaire.

We would be delighted to speak with you over the telephone and answer any questions that you might have. We can be reached, via telephone, between the hours of 09:00 and 17:00, Eastern Time, Monday to Friday at (416) 482-3387.

By all means, you are welcome to come to our office. Because Mr. Abrams is responsible for maintaining correspondence, via e-mail, with our many clients around the world as well as the thousands of individuals, such as yourself, who seek information over the Internet, Mr. Peter Krochak meets with potential clients in our office while Mr. Abrams looks after the e-mail. Should you wish to schedule an appointment, please telephone Mr. Krochak at (416) 482-3387, Extension 23 between the hours of 09:00 and 17:00, Eastern Time, Monday to Friday.

Please be advised that we shall be pleased to answer any and all specific questions that you might have with respect to documentary requirements if and when you become our client. We cannot, however, inform you as to which supporting documents are required from you before you formally retain our services. Suffice it to say, though, if there is a problem in obtaining any sort of document, Citizenship and Immigration Canada officials are reasonable people and will accept a handwritten explanation from you as to the absence of a particular document in lieu of the document, itself.

We strongly recommend that you do NOT go to the time and expense of acquiring and translating supporting documents until such time as you have received our firm's preliminary package, which contains detailed instructions regarding the format and substance that your supporting documents must take to maximize your chances of success and interview waiver.

It is understood (and to be expected) that individuals may not have all of the documents as requested by Citizenship and Immigration Canada. The general rule is this: If, for whatever reason, an applicant is either unable or unwilling to provide any one (1) or more of the documents as requested by Citizenship and Immigration Canada officials, he/she must provide our office with a handwritten explanation as to why the document(s) is/are unavailable so that we may communicate same to Citizenship and Immigration Canada and ask that Citizenship and Immigration Canada waive the requirement of the filing of that/those particular document(s). The only time that our Money-Back Guarantee would not apply is if the individual does not provide our office with the requested document OR the handwritten explanation. To date, this situation has NEVER arisen in all of the years that our law firm has been in business.

Please note that we do not have branch offices. We effectively represent thousands of individuals on all six (6) continents from our offices here in Toronto, Canada, through the use of e-mail, fax, telephone, mail and courier.

No, we do not have agents and no individual and/or organization is authorized to represent our interests in Canada and/or abroad. If individuals are interested in using our services, we would prefer that they contact us, directly, rather than through a third party.

We have been approached by countless individuals, who informed us that they knew that they were qualified to immigrate to Canada and had all of the necessary documents and then went ahead to apply for Permanent Residence in Canada on their own and failed. It is true that there is not much that our firm can do insofar as some of your documents are concerned (i.e. a birth certificate is a birth certificate, a marriage certificate is a marriage certificate, etc.); however, we caution you, now, that if your letters of reference are in the least bit deficient or your Application forms have not been completed, correctly, you will surely jeopardize the expeditious processing of your Application for Permanent Residence. Among the services that we provide are ensuring that your letters of reference comply with Citizenship and Immigration Canada's standards; ensuring that your Application forms have been filled out correctly (incidentally, we rarely have seen the forms filled out correctly); and drafting written, legal arguments, which will accompany your Application package and which will argue why you should be issued a Canadian immigrant visa. The analogy we provide where our arguments are concerned is that of a painter. Paint, in and of itself, is beautiful. However, paint has no meaning unless it is used by a painter to paint a beautiful picture. In the immigration context, your qualifications may be impressive; however, if you do not have effective representation whereby a lawyer will highlight your qualifications for Citizenship and Immigration Canada officials to appreciate, your qualifications can get lost/overlooked in your mountain of supporting documents.

Please note that we are NOT immigration consultants; rather, we are immigration lawyers. There is a significant difference between consultants and lawyers. Unlike lawyers, many consultants are:

1. unregulated;
2. unlicensed;
3. unaccountable; and
4. uneducated.

Furthermore, if a Consultant is situated in a country other than Canada, he/she is NOT permitted, by Canadian law, to represent your interests in the Federal Court of Canada, should an appeal of a negative immigration decision be required in your case. Please keep this information in mind when choosing who to represent you.

The speed with which we work depends entirely upon you. As you know, we respond to all e-mails/regular mail/fax transmissions/courier shipments within one (1) business day from the time of receipt.

Let us assume, for example, that you fax your signed Agreement with Abrams & Krochak and your credit card authorization to our office on a Monday. That very same day, you will receive our firm's preliminary package, via e-mail, which contains all of the necessary forms, document checklists, instructions and information so as to enable you to commence the immigration process to Canada with our assistance. Assuming that you complete the Application forms in draft, accurately, and fax them to our office on Tuesday, you will have the forms sent, via e-mail, to your Inbox no later than Wednesday. Assuming that you ship your documents to our office on Thursday and they arrive in Toronto the following Monday, and assuming that your documentation is complete, you will have our written, legal arguments in your Inbox for your review and approval no later than Tuesday. Assuming that you provide us with your approval of the written, legal arguments on Tuesday, your Application package can be filed by our office with Citizenship and Immigration Canada officials that very same day. In total, the entire process would take one (1) week.

As you can see, therefore, our law firm works as quickly as you do.

If you would like to verify our authenticity, you are welcome to contact the Law Society of Upper Canada, which is the governing body for lawyers in the Province of Ontario, Canada. Their telephone number is: (416) 947-3300; their e-mail address is: lawsociety@lsuc.on.ca and their website is: http://www.lsuc.on.ca. As professional lawyers, we have a professional obligation to act in our clients' best interest and can be professionally disciplined for failure to do so. Please note that our firm is also listed in the Canadian Yellow Pages under the heading of "Lawyers" in the Province of Ontario.

By virtue of the fact that we have sent you an unconditional favourable assessment of your qualifications for immigration to Canada and have offered you a full 100% money-back guarantee, you can deduce that you meet or surpass the minimum sixty-seven (67) point pass mark.

In the past, we provided the actual point total to potential clients; however, it became apparent to us that many individuals were using our free assessment as a means of confirming their point total before filing an Application for Permanent Residence in Canada on their own without using our services. For this reason, we have discontinued disclosing point totals to prospective clients. We shall be pleased to provide you with a detailed breakdown of our point calculation for you when you become our client.

Please note that we are very cautious about the types of cases we positively assess. Our firm enjoys a near 100% success rate with clients, who retain us, via the Internet because we do not accept cases that are borderline and that have no hope of succeeding. Suffice it to say, if we positively assessed your qualifications for immigration to Canada, we believe that you stand a very good chance of applying for and receiving Canadian Permanent Residence with our assistance and, consequently, we have offered you a 100% money-back guarantee. Our firm could not stay in business if we had to refund clients' legal fees. We do not believe in wasting people's time and money and our reputation is far too important for us to risk making "quick" profits at our clients' expense. Our firm thrives on referrals from satisfied clients.

We have provided you with our assessment and our Agreement.

If you would like to retain/engage our services, you need only print your name and insert your signature on the Agreement, where indicated, and return the document to our office with your initial payment of our legal fees.

If remitting the first installment of our legal fees, via wire transfer or credit card, the signed Agreement can be faxed or scanned and e-mailed to our office.

If remitting the first installment of our legal fees, via money order/bank draft/cashier's cheque/traveller's cheque, the signed Agreement can be sent to our office, via mail or courier, in the same envelope as that in which you enclose your payment.

Just as soon as your initial payment has been received by our office, we shall prepare our preliminary package to send to you, via e-mail, which contains all of the necessary forms, document checklists, instructions and information so as to enable you to commence the Immigration Application process with our assistance.

As Canadian immigration laws, regulations and policies are always subject to change at any time without advance notice, we can make no assurances to you whatsoever that you will still qualify if you defer your proposed Canadian immigration plans to a later date.

As you know, you will be paying legal fees to Abrams & Krochak. While we do not charge you any extra money for disbursements, we do deduct the cost of all expenses related to your file from our legal fees.

Therefore, assuming that during the life of your file, you incur the following expenses (for example):

From the legal fees that you will have paid to us, we reimburse ourselves for disbursements incurred by Abrams & Krochak on your account. Therefore, we would take 130 USD in disbursements from your total legal fees. If your Application for Permanent Residence does not succeed, you will be reimbursed all the legal fees paid to Abrams & Krochak MINUS disbursements. Please note, however, that disbursements rarely exceed 100 USD.

Regrettably, our legal fees, money-back guarantee and schedule of payments are non-negotiable (i.e. we do not operate on a "fly now, pay later" basis).

Our SWIFT code is NOSCCATT. Should your bank have any questions, they are welcome to contact Scotiabank:
Scotiabank
555 Yonge Street
Toronto, Ontario
M4Y 1Y5 CANADA
(416) 515-2800

If we have not confirmed receipt of your shipment, we have not received it. It is not our practice to receive courier shipments and then remain silent. If you would like to ascertain the current status of your shipment, we suggest that you contact your courier company.

Applications for Permanent Residence in Canada must be filed with the Canadian visa office, which has geographic responsibility for the country in which the applicant has been lawfully admitted and has resided for a period of at least one (1) year. Otherwise, the applicant must apply for Permanent Residence in Canada through the Canadian visa office, which has geographic responsibility for his/her country of habitual residence.

Processing times will depend on:

1. the Canadian visa office through which you intend to apply for Permanent Residence in Canada;
2. whether an immigration interview is deemed necessary in your case;
3. the complexity of your case;
4. how well your case is presented; and
5. the existing caseload in a Canadian visa office at a given time.

Nobody can promise you a specific processing timeframe and any lawyer/consultant that guarantees processing times is being less than truthful with you. Lawyers/consultants can give estimates; however, they CANNOT guarantee processing times as processing times are ALWAYS subject to change WITHOUT advance notice.

Do not choose a law firm on the basis of how quickly they promise your case will be processed. Rather, choose a law firm that you feel will be competent to prepare your case correctly and expeditiously and be attentive to your needs.

Please take note of the following information, regarding interview waivers.

When assessing an Application for Permanent Residence in Canada in the independent/skilled worker category, Citizenship and Immigration Canada officials must satisfy themselves of several factors, including but not limited to:

1. the applicant's English or French language ability;
2. the applicant's educational qualifications;
3. the applicant's ability to perform the job duties and responsibilities of his/her occupation(s) as established by Citizenship and Immigration Canada through his/her work experience, to date;
4. the applicant's adaptability, resourcefulness and motivation to successfully establish himself/herself in Canada; and
5. the applicant's good character.

If, upon reviewing the applicant's Application package, Citizenship and Immigration Canada officials are satisfied that the documents filed address and satisfy each one of these factors, the recommendation can be made that the applicant's Application for Permanent Residence in Canada be approved without the need for a personal interview, thereby expediting the processing of the applicant's Application for Permanent Residence in Canada.

The official policy of Citizenship and Immigration Canada has been that unless you work for a "blue chip" company (i.e. IBM, Coca-Cola, Johnson & Johnson, Nestlé, etc.) with an international presence and which can be easily recognized, you will more than likely be called to an interview if you file your Application for Permanent Residence with a Canadian visa office other than the one, which normally serves your jurisdiction.

Please note, also, that even if you WERE to apply through the Canadian visa office, which normally serves your jurisdiction, although we make every effort to have your immigration interview waived, an interview may still be required because Citizenship and Immigration Canada officials randomly select very qualified applicants for "Quality Assurance Interviews" whereby the Department has an opportunity to satisfy itself that it is making the right decisions as to which cases merit waivers of interview.

You must take an approved language test if you are claiming abilities in a language that is not your native language.

Approved English Tests

• International English Language Testing System (IELTS)
  http://www.ielts.org
• Canadian International Language Proficiency Index Program (CELPIP)
  http://www.lpi.ubc.ca/celpip.htm

Approved French Tests

• Test d'evaluation de Fracais (TEF)
  http://www.fda.ccip.fr/

The Government of Canada has vacillated back and forth on this issue. It used to be that all applicants age eighteen (18) and over had to attend the interview with the understanding that if a spouse or adult child could not, for whatever reason, attend the interview, the requirement of his/her attendance would be waived. Then the Government changed its policy and stated that adult dependants did NOT have to attend the interview. Now, the pendulum has swung back to the original position and adult dependants must attend the interview. Ultimately, it is subject to the discretion of the visa officer, having carriage of the file, as to whether to waive the requirement that an adult dependant be interviewed if he/she does not present himself/herself at the interview.

Only spouses/partners and dependent children can be included on an Application for Permanent Residence in Canada as accompanying dependants. Parents cannot. You may, however, be eligible to sponsor your parents to immigrate to Canada as Members of the Family Class once you are residing here as a permanent resident of this country and meet low income cutoff requirements as established by Citizenship and Immigration Canada officials.

In order for children age twenty-two (22) and over to accompany a parent to Canada as dependants, the children must be unmarried, continuously enrolled in a full-time program of education and financially dependent upon the parent since their twenty-second (22nd) birthdays. Otherwise, they must apply on their own (assuming that they are qualified).

If an interview is deemed necessary in your case, most Canadian visa offices schedule interviews in no less than one (1) year's time from the date that an Application for Permanent Residence is filed. Therefore, if you applied for Permanent Residence in Canada in April 2002 and an interview were to be deemed necessary in your case, your interview would likely not take place until April 2003 at the earliest. Assuming that your interview is successful and you are issued your Immigration Medical Examination form, you can defer undergoing your Immigration Medical Examination for several months (i.e. June 2003) and, consequently, your immigrant visa would be valid until June 2004 (one (1) year from the date of your Immigration Medical Examination). Then, in June 2004, you would enter Canada and immediately leave. Under Canada's new Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, you can then remain outside of Canada for no more than three (3) years within any five (5) year period without being deemed to have abandoned your Canadian Permanent Residence.

Your temporary entry to Canada is subject to the discretion of the immigration officer at the Canadian port of entry and they may refuse you entry if they know that you have applied for Permanent Residence in Canada and are, thus, an intending immigrant and not merely a visitor. If questioned whether you have an Application for Permanent Residence in progress, you must answer this question, truthfully; however, you should emphasize that your visit to Canada is merely temporary in nature and that it is your full intention to leave Canada upon the completion of your visit. Generally speaking, most of our clients in your situation have never experienced any difficulties, attempting to enter Canada as visitors while their Applications for Permanent Residence were in process although entry is NEVER guaranteed.

Please note that aside from our legal fees, you must ALSO pay the Government of Canada's fees. The Government of Canada's fees consist of non-refundable processing fees and Right of Permanent Residence fees, which ARE refundable in the event that you submit the fees at the outset of the Application process and your Application for Permanent Residence does not succeed.

The fees for the Independent/Skilled Worker Class are as follows:

The fees for the Family Class are as follows:

The following settlement fund requirements apply to those applying for Permanent Residence in Canada in the Independent/Skilled Worker Class:

Regrettably, we do not provide job search/settlement services separate and apart from our Canadian immigration legal services.

Yes we do. Please send an e-mail to askus@akcanada.com for further information regarding our Canadian Citizenship Application services and fees.

Because we are Canadian and not U.S. immigration lawyers, we can be of no assistance to you insofar as immigrating to the United States is concerned. With that having been said, kindly contact our colleagues at Kolken & Kolken in Buffalo, New York, U.S.A., whose website address is http://www.sackskolken.com and who are U.S. immigration attorneys.

Please take note of the fact that we do not accept cases of individuals whose cases are already in progress and who are encountering difficulties with the processing of their Applications for Permanent Residence in Canada. Our firm handles cases from start to finish and most of our clients have their interviews waived and their cases finalized within a relatively short period of time. We do not, however, get involved in cases, midway through the process.

Please take note of the fact that our website is not designed to answer specific questions of individuals, who have no intention of using our services (i.e. who have already applied/who intend to apply for permanent and/or temporary status in Canada on their own).

Unfortunately, we regret to inform you that we are not interested in your proposal. If individuals in your country are interested in using our services, we would prefer that they contact us, directly, rather than through a third party.

Please note that although we provide a free assessment of immigration qualifications over the Internet, we do not provide free summary legal advice or descriptions of Canadian immigration laws, regulations or policies in the same fashion. For further information, please contact your nearest Canadian visa office (i.e. High Commission/Embassy/Consulate).