A Historic Express Entry Draw!

umkaadmin — Sat, 13 Feb 2021 15:28:41 +0000

A Historic Express Entry Draw!

By CENK KEMAL HAZNACI

27,332 invitations to apply in a single draw!!

Today, February 13, 2021, marks a historic day in Express Entry and Canadian immigration in general. A whooping 27,332 Express Entry profiles under Canadian Experience Class were invited to apply for permanent residence in Canada. This is HUGE! To put things into perspective, shortly before this Express Entry draw, the EE pool had 152,714 candidates in it. That means 1/5.5 of Express Entry candidates got an invitation. This has never happened before.

the lowest cut-off score ever — 75!

The cut-off score was a shocking 75! This is the lowest cut-off ever. What that means is currently there is likely no one left without an invitation to apply in Express Entry pool under Canadian Experience Class.

What will be the ripple effects of this?

With so many Canadian Experience Class people suddenly out of the pool, it is not unreasonable to think the cut-off score will drop for other programs as well. Provincial Nominee Program class people inherently don’t have a hard time securing a high CRS score, but for Federal Skilled Worker it is another story. So, rejoice FSW people! You might see much more favorable cut-off scores in the coming draws.
The previous record high of invitees in a single draw was 5,000. Now that this record is shattered by a landslide, it is not hard to predict an enormous workload for IRCC case processing agents and visa officers. This might reflect in longer processing times for all Express Entry applicants. We were already having slow-downs due to COVID-19, this now might push things even further into an uncomfortable zone. With that said, we also know that IRCC is hiring officers as we speak/type/read. Will they be able to absord such a load without a prolonged processing time? Time will tell.

Why such a ginormous draw?

In October 2020, Government of Canada had already announced its plans to support economic recovery though immigration. Due to COVID-19, Canada’s immigration numbers had fallen and did not meet the 2020 targets.

In a press release today, Government of Canada points to the fact that travel restrictions limit the intake of immigrants. To tackle that, they have turned their attention to temporary residents who are already in Canada. That mainly means temporary foreign workers as Canadian Experience Class requires at least 1 year of Canadian work experience.

Ultimately, this giant draw is part of Canada’s economic recovery efforts.

Congratulations to everyone who got an invitation to apply today! Should you need help with filing your application, do not hesitate to contact us at contact@umkaimmigration.ca

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Why work with an immigration consultant?

umkaadmin — Fri, 18 Oct 2019 04:24:15 +0000

Why work with an immigration consultant?

By CENK KEMAL HAZNACI, RCIC

First of all, you don’t have to work with an immigration consultant to be successful in a Canadian immigration application. Then why work with one? I’ll give you my two cents about it in three aspects:

You
An RCIC (Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultant)
Other factors

1. You

TIME = MONEY

Without a doubt, the “You” aspect is the most decisive factor of all. After all, you pay the money; it is your immigration application; and you know yourself the best.

You have to look at the pros and cons of going at it alone. How much time will it take you to learn about how to submit an application? How much time will it take you to learn about other potential programs and streams? How much time will it take you to make sure you don’t miss anything? Do you have that much time? And how much is your time worth? In other words, how much do you make in an hour, doing what you do for a living? I used the word ‘time’ a lot because this will take a heck of a lot of time. And time is money.

I’ll give you a bit of a first-hand information here because I did this weighing the pros and cons thing for myself in 2014. At the time, I was in Turkey, working as a freelance translator and pondering on moving to Canada. And honestly, I didn’t do the pros and cons correctly. I couldn’t estimate the time to be spent accurately. And I didn’t even take into account my time’s worth. The sticker shock was enough for me to make up my mind when I received my first quote from an immigration consultant. I ran the other way and did not ask another consultant for their fees ever again.

The initial learning of how Canadian immigration system works probably took me about 200 hours. This requires going through immigration forums every day, reading through the IRCC website and trying to read/watch whatever else you can find to get some kind of guidance and wrap your head around the things you see for the first time. So if your first application is successful, 200 hours might be the time you expect to spend to get there.

THE MATH

The math is simple—multiply your hourly rate with 200. If the result is smaller than what your immigration consultant quoted you, going at it on your own might be a financially viable choice. That is until you make a mistake and your application is rejected and you have to start over. That’s exactly what happened with me. After my application was returned for being incomplete—effectively making me lose my chances since the mail took 3 months to reach Turkey and it was already 2015 by then and the submission window had been closed—I had to go through a whole system makeover in 2015 (the introduction of Express Entry), a provincial nominee application and a second federal PR application. The hours I spent probably exceeded 600. So sometimes even doing the math right might not save you.

LACK OF EXPERIENCE

That takes me to another question: Will the effort you put in to learn things be enough for you as an inexperienced applicant, especially when the matter is of a life-changing nature, such as an immigration application? Even when you think you don’t make errors too easily, a squeezed schedule, lesser hours to sleep etc. might turn the tables on anyone. You have to get it right at your first try. Not everyone is cut out for this kind of a gamble.

2. An RCIC

The second aspect is a Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultant, a. k. a. RCIC. This part is going to be easy.

An RCIC will charge you not just for the time they’ll spend on your application, but also the time they spent on learning and becoming who they became—a person with training and experience in immigration matters.

A PROFESSION

RCICs make a living out of immigration services. Your application is not going to be their first. Even if it is a new RCIC, you will still be in good hands because as per the regulations and codes of ICCRC—the regulating body for Canadian immigration consultants—RCICs lacking experience or competence in an immigration matter must introduce a co-counsel (an experienced RCIC or an immigration lawyer) to your case. All in all, an RCIC’s chance of a grave error is greatly lower than yours.

RCICs go through Practice Management Education sessions and must meet Continuing Professional Development requirements on a continuous basis, which means having to attend immigration-related events, webinars and training sessions regularly. And we are audited annually.

A WIDER VIEW

In Canada, federal programs and provincial streams combined, there are almost a hundred ways to go to for immigration. An applicant might not be aware of all of their options. By looking at your answers to an intake questionnaire, an RCIC can show you alternative routes that you might never have thought of. That is one of the biggest values RCICs add to you.

NUANCES

You may be surprised to hear this, but Canadian immigration processing is not carried out uniformly throughout the world. There is officer discretion in most matters, and some visa offices might be quite harsh while others might be lenient. Knowing the behavioral patterns, the nuances, of visa offices makes a difference.

LEGAL JARGON

RCICs almost always write a submission letter and submit it along with your application. A submission letter addresses the weak and/or strong points of an application and makes a case for a positive decision. We cite the relevant articles from Immigration and Refugee Protection Regulations and Act and also the case law in support of the application. This eases the visa officer’s job and often leads them towards a favorable decision.

3. Other factors

Full representation is not the only service most RCICs offer. All you need might be an Initial Consultation Session to clear your head about a few things you got stuck on before submitting that application. An hour of consultation session might be a cheap but a very effective solution for some.

When you do everything on your own and fail, you have no one but yourself to blame. When you work with an RCIC, you can always blame them! LOL. But I know you’ll be nice and not do that to your RCIC. Kidding aside, if you think something was not done right, you have rights.

CONCLUSION

As I said at the beginning, you don’t have to retain a professional to be successful in a Canadian immigration application. It all boils down to you and your needs. If your time is valuable, I think it is a no-brainer—you have no reason not to go with an RCIC. Even if your time is not that valuable and when you do the math you spend a few hundred dollars less without retaining an RCIC, think about what you read above. I think you are still much better off working with an RCIC.

canada immigration – Umka Immigration Consulting

A Historic Express Entry Draw!