Hi everybody welcome to our Channel today I wanted to make a video on
citizenship application I'm going to talk about 7 tips on how to prepare your
citizenship application to ensure that it's processed smoothly and that it's approved
tip number one make sure that you have all the rights required
documentation so there are certain documents on the document checklist
which might take a couple of weeks or a couple of us to get so make sure you
have those before you apply for example right now if you have lived in certain
for certain number of time outside of Canada during the eligibility period of
your citizenship application you do need to provide a police clearance and
sometimes that takes some time so make sure you look at that before you start
preparing and finalizing your application. Tip number 2 correct
calculations for your citizenship residency requirements so right now the
law in order to become a Canadian citizen is you have to spend three years
out of the last five years in Canada physically in your application there are
forms that you have to fill out so make sure that the days that you write are
the correct dates I always advise clients will become permanent residents
up until the time that they're going to apply for citizenship to keep an excel
sheet with all of your ins and outs of Canada with the dates of proper calendar
system and also keep a record of all your flight confirmations, boarding
passes and any other evidence you have that can show your travel
because even if you do indicate on your forms certain dates, it doesn't
necessarily mean that the officers are going to believe you so if you've
traveled a lot and if your days are very tight and there's other concerns in your
file the officer could scrutinize your application and then send you what's
called a residence questionnaire or send you a letter with questions about
where have you been? Oh you said you were traveling here, do you have any evidence?
Can you show me that you actually left? Can you show me you were actually in Canada?
Do you have anything to prove to me that you were in Canada for for all this time?
so sometimes immigration might ask for health care records or exit and entry
records or bank statements or any document that shows that you're actually
living in Canada unfortunately there are a lot of people that lie in their
applications so because of that officers have to do their job so they have to
make sure that people that are applying for clearances should actually leave the
days so make sure you include your correct calculation and then you have a
backup as a sheet with an explanation and your evidence that you're
keeping just in case there's a citizenship interview or a hearing that
takes place or you get sent the letter that asks you for further evidence if
you provide everything and the officer is satisfied that your application is
going to be approved. Tip number three language requirements make sure that
before you apply you make sure that if you do need to take a test for your
citizenship that you do take the test sometimes I could take a couple of weeks
to schedule and then obtain the results so you need that to apply for your application
Tip number four once your application is
ready to go don't send it by regular mail always make sure you send it by
courier. FedEx or Post Canada I prefer FedEx over post Canada because FedEx has
more they guarantee the days and whereas Post Canada even if they say
one or two days it could take three or four days and with a signature other
Post Canada or FedEx or any other courier company that you trust because
if you do send it by regular mail it can get lost it's a big package just an
important document and also there's no "it could get lost in immigration" in
their offices doesn't happen often but it does happen sometimes and it can be
very frustrating because you could file your application, immigration rules on to
it for many months or finds it months later or you submitted it and then you
don't hear anything you can't contact them they just tell you you know general
information on the website says it could take this long and then eventually
they've drawn you find out that maybe didn't even receive it but if you do
send it by registered mail or courier then there's a tracker the tracking
number you have someone that signed for it so if they say that they can't find
out for some reason you can simply launch and you do have it and they can
look into it further tip number five once you have had their application
immigration is going to correspond with you many times when they're processing
it so always make sure that you verify your mail and your email if you have a
lawyer and file usually your lawyer gets everything but if you do have a final
sometimes they can send you, send an email to the client directly sometimes
usually nowadays they communicate by email but sometimes they do send the
by mail as well so always make sure you check your emails, your spam folders,
your mail at home, because if you do miss the letters and in citizenship they kind of
they could give you timelines pretty quickly you can get a letter that says
you have to come to your testing next week or in two weeks and then you can
get a letter that says you have an it citizenship interview next week or you
have your oath ceremony next week and if you're traveling or you're not checking
email then you can the days and pass very fast and then you've missed
everything so you have to send letters ask if you can do it again and that
could delay everything another place to check also is online immigration has an
online status portal where you can go in and check the status of your application
for different about all applications have this most application have its
citizenship has it for citizenship applications as lawyers, at our office we
check that but we don't rely on that because we find that it's not always
updated information so sometimes we may have gotten a letter maybe our client
has already become a citizen and then if you go online that says we have received
their application it's processing it's not the best system for the most
updated information so as lawyers we don't verify that we verify that but we
don't rely on that but we do verify it because sometimes it has happened that a
letter is sent out we never got it even though we're lawyer on file we never got it we
went online that said a letter was sent to us on this date but we never received
an email or a letter so then you have to contact immigration and say you never
sent me that. Usually I would say generally we get everything that immigration sent
to us but the system is not perfect of course so sometimes they might send a
letter by regular mail - gets lost, they say this sent it but they didn't send it,
sometimes I send an email and I see it, it says "sent" I call the person I sent it to
they don't receive anything - no junk, no spam. It happens so check the
online system at the same time as you check the email and the paper but don't
just for example don't only rely on the online system and another thing with the
online system is very often will say "sent letter", but the next day or the day
after you can't be like "I didn't get the letter". I find usually it takes about a
week sometimes a little bit more to get the letter because just because they say
sent the letter it doesn't mean they sent the letter on that day and
immigration usually sends all the letters by regular mail so if you get
holidays and weekends and regular mail could easily take five to seven-eight
business days so just be mindful of that .Tip number six if you can't make your
citizenship if you have to take the test and you can't make it or you can make
your oath ceremony make sure you send a letter as soon as you can asking
explaining why you can't make it and also asking them to reschedule usually
they're pretty good at rescheduling it, they want rescheduled forever so make
sure you try to do it as soon as you can it's possible, we've had some clients travelling and they weren't able
to attend so as long as you provide an explanation and you submit a good right
way and they receive it it should be reschedule. Final tip when you go to your
oath ceremony this is after your application has been filed and approved
make sure you come with your identity documentation on the letter it says to
bring your ID and also that letter and also any documentation, any original
documentation that you submit that you have that you use to submit your
application so usually that means the letter that you received, your passports
original passport, your PR card or your landing paper and if there are some
special circumstances in your case where you have to give other documentation
original clearances or something like that you can bring those as well very
important if you are a permanent resident you don't have your PR card to
bring your landing paper which is called also a confirmation of permanent
residents there's a lot of people that live in Canada that are permanent
residents but who never renewed their card because they didn't need to they
weren't traveling but they're permanent residents because they have been
approved and they have the confirmation of permanent residents paper or the
landing paper but if you don't have that and your permanent resident it's
important to apply for what's called the verification of status which is a
document you apply online last time we did not the office took about a week or
so it's a document that says verification of status (VOS) this
person is a permanent resident of Canada so that kind of replaces your landing paper or
your confirmation of permanent residence if you don't have it but there are
a lot of people that they didn't keep that, they got landed in Canada maybe five,
ten, twenty years ago they can't find it, but when you go to your citizenship oath
ceremony they need to identify you, so as a permanent resident
as well so if you like I'm a PR card you need to have
landing paper and if you don't have that then you need to you should apply for a
verification of status documents. Thank you and if you have any questions you
can submit an email at info@keyorkimmigration.com