Applicant from PhD program after 5 Nov, 2011 connect here to get status

[cdhbamboo]

Just a quick question:

The human resource department at one of the universities I worked in told me clearly today that they wont be stating the duties and responsibilities in the letter that they give me. So pretty much they would give me the same letter I submitted to CIC before. Should I just ask for a letter from the department to cover this gap? Cos I really dont want to submit another letter from the human resource dept. since I am now afraid they may (though highly unlikely) provide some contradictory  information. thank you asbereth

With my current university, I can get all info in the same letter and I have a earlier copy to compare and eliminate contradictions.

I used a letter from department to explain the duties and responsibilities and they accepted it. BTW, it is better for you this time to provide information as much as possible, like T4 and T4A, and anything else you could come up with. This time the officer is nice to give you time to provide the additional letters. But next time and others could be different. Good luck, and wish you get this fixed and PER soon!

[asbereth]

I used a letter from department to explain the duties and responsibilities and they accepted it. BTW, it is better for you this time to provide information as much as possible, like T4 and T4A, and anything else you could come up with. This time the officer is nice to give you time to provide the additional letters. But next time and others could be different. Good luck, and wish you get this fixed and PER soon!

Yeah. I got a letter from HR (which is responsible for TA, but not RA/GRS), but I then realized that it would not be good for anything since it's missing job responsibilities and descriptions (though it had everything else asked for). Also, the number of hours would be nowhere near enough (since it's only either 5 or 10 hours for TA per term).

I then consulted my supervisor, and he agreed to let me draft the letter of reference, with the number of hours and job descriptions on it (TA + RA both, even though I had had the letter from HR for TA already at this point). The department head then signed it. I sent both the letters from HR and my department along with other documents (and also T4s and T4As from 2009 and 2010, since 2011 was not yet available at the time).

[Shomo]

Hi Guys,

I found this thread today and I am happy I did Here are my info:
Application Reached CIO: 10 Nov 2011
Credit Card Charged: 10 Jan 2012
PER Issued: 13 March 2012
Current eCAS status: In Process - We received your application on 10 Nov 2011.
No. of persons in Application: 2
TA Experience: Included + Others
Nationality: Iran

Currently: Waiting for AOR

[snow_walker]

Hi Guys,

I found this thread today and I am happy I did Here are my info:
Application Reached CIO: 10 Nov 2011
Credit Card Charged: 10 Jan 2012
PER Issued: 13 March 2012
Current eCAS status: In Process - We received your application on 10 Nov 2011.
No. of persons in Application: 2
TA Experience: Included + Others
Nationality: Iran
Currently: Waiting for AOR

spreadsheet updated.

And as I said earlier, to me it seems that the early applications are going through a different process with less workforce. And all applicants are getting PER after around ~90-100 days....

[TyrusX]

Congrats Shomo, and thanks for giving us all the information. And it really seems that early applicants are moving a lot slower than the new ones.

[asbereth]

Shomo, congratulations!!! It must be hard waiting 124 days for PER (the longest time we have so far). Hopefully the rest of the process will be faster for all of us.

Anyway, is anybody familiar with the whole process? So what happens after PER? And what is the difference between 1st AOR and 2nd AOR? If I'm not mistaken, past applicants have been getting their medicals really shortly after their AOR, so is it something that PhD stream applicants should expect as well?

What we do know so far though, at least based on the information provided here, we can tell that the CIO does more than check our enrollment, but also our eligibility (based on the continuous one year of full-time work experience), and in fact, they assess if applicants have enough points. I'm really hoping that the VO would be no different in interpretation in assigning points than the CIO.

[s.guo82]

I got my NER today. The reason and wording are almost the same as what Mapledream got. I got no adaptability points, 1 point less to pass. I am thinking about resubmitting the application, claiming for 3 yrs working experience from my TA and RA. However, how do you guys calculate ur exact total RA working hrs in the letter? Just 8hrs a day or using what salary sheet says, which is too little as we all know some of them are in the scholarship and T4A?

[asbereth]

I got my NER today. The reason and wording are almost the same as what Mapledream got. I got no adaptability points, 1 point less to pass. I am thinking about resubmitting the application, claiming for 3 yrs working experience from my TA and RA. However, how do you guys calculate ur exact total RA working hrs in the letter? Just 8hrs a day or using what salary sheet says, which is too little as we all know some of them are in the scholarship and T4A?

s.guo82, I'm really sorry for your NER.

Do you mind telling us exactly what letters you submitted for your work experience? If I'm not mistaken, you mentioned that you claimed 2000+ hours only on your taxable portion. Since the taxable portion for most of us is usually the TA, I'm actually wondering how you could claim so many hours on taxable income alone. Or maybe your RA is income also taxable (which was not the case for most people here in this forum)? At least what we know for sure is, the reason for your rejection was not that you did not have continuous one-year of full-time work experience, so we know that they consider your TA/RA experience as legit work experience.

Also, how many years have you done your PhD? Maybe if you tell us the breakdown of your work experience, we can work something out, but I still doubt that PhD RA/TA alone can give you more than 3,900 hours. If you have only done a little over 2 years of PhD, then claiming 20 - 25 hours a week, the most that you can claim is probably around 2,500 - 3,000 hours.

If you go back 10 years from right now, do you think you can accumulate at least 2 years of work experience (3,900 hours) of skill level 0, A, or B? Was your Master's degree paid, or was it self-funded?

Anyway, I suppose your NER confirmed that adaptability points are only awarded for those who completed a program of two years, not having completed two years of the program. I suppose that's the reason why they didn't just make this PhD stream a stream of CEC rather than FSW (if you notice, all categories for CEC would have been FSW with more points than 67). What a bummer

[s.guo82]

s.guo82, I'm really sorry for your NER.

Do you mind telling us exactly what letters you submitted for your work experience? If I'm not mistaken, you mentioned that you claimed 2000+ hours only on your taxable portion. Since the taxable portion for most of us is usually the TA, I'm actually wondering how you could claim so many hours on taxable income alone. Or maybe your RA is income also taxable (which was not the case for most people here in this forum)? At least what we know for sure is, the reason for your rejection was not that you did not have continuous one-year of full-time work experience, so we know that they consider your TA/RA experience as legit work experience.

Also, how many years have you done your PhD? Maybe if you tell us the breakdown of your work experience, we can work something out, but I still doubt that PhD RA/TA alone can give you more than 3,900 hours. If you have only done a little over 2 years of PhD, then claiming 20 - 25 hours a week, the most that you can claim is probably around 2,500 - 3,000 hours.

If you go back 10 years from right now, do you think you can accumulate at least 2 years of work experience (3,900 hours) of skill level 0, A, or B? Was your Master's degree paid, or was it self-funded?

Anyway, I suppose your NER confirmed that adaptability points are only awarded for those who completed a program of two years, not having completed two years of the program. I suppose that's the reason why they didn't just make this PhD stream a stream of CEC rather than FSW (if you notice, all categories for CEC would have been FSW with more points than 67). What a bummer

Yes, u r right. TA alone did not give me more than 2000 hrs working experience. My RA also has an hourly rate, so I simply added them up. I am in my fourth year and I had more than 2200hrs in total. I gave them a verification letter from HR and a spread sheet showing my hourly rate, working hours based on T4 form and total income.

Do you think I should only submit a letter from HR showing TA only while send them another letter from department or supervisor to prove my full time RA work? Maybe include T4 and T4a at the same time?

[TyrusX]

s.guo82, I'm really sorry for your NER.

Sorry s.guo82.Better to get a strong reference letter from your supervisor and all the professor of all the classes you taught.  Then print some of the payslips that you received and attach as well, together with t4 and t4a.

[Shomo]

Thanks TyrusX and asbereth. The waiting was not that bad for me, because at the time i didn't know this forum. So I didn't know there were people who had applied later than me and got PERs before me. My information was limited to three of my friends who applied kind of at the same time with me and I know that till last week they had not heard anything back from CIO.

[TyrusX]

Thanks TyrusX and asbereth. The waiting was not that bad for me, because at the time i didn't know this forum. So I didn't know there were people who had applied later than me and got PERs before me. My information was limited to three of my friends who applied kind of at the same time with me and I know that till last week they had not heard anything back from CIO.

Please Shomo, can you invite them to the forum as well?

[AST]

Applications received toward the overall cap: 479 of 1,000

[TyrusX]

Applications received toward the overall cap: 479 of 1,000

About 12 more weeks until cap is reached if things keep going like this. Average of last 3 weeks was around 55 applicants per week.

[asbereth]

Sorry s.guo82.Better to get a strong reference letter from your supervisor and all the professor of all the classes you taught.  Then print some of the payslips that you received and attach as well, together with t4 and t4a.

Ya, but the thing is, he submitted before letters from HR that detail the hours for RA as well, so whatever letters he will get from his supervisor should not contradict the information given by the HR (for example, if it is mentioned by HR that he worked 20 hours a week for RA, he can't have his supervisor say that he did 40 hours of RA work per week for the same period). Which is why I think you should focus on getting strong letters for the non-taxable parts (since you can probably claim 25 hours for some periods where you did not claim anything before), since the immigration does not yet have this information before.