Woohoo! Finally a landed immigrant!
It was a very stressful day though! We arrived 10 minutes in advance at Complexe Guy-Favreau. The room where the interview would be, was dark and nobody there. At 13:00, nobody showed up. We got nervous, after a few minutes still nobody. So we started to ask at the Immigration Board for refugees (or something like that, it sounded like something from CIC), but nobody knew about it. They told us we should ask at Service Canada, because it's their room. At Service Canada, nobody knew about a meeting there. Tried the CIC call centre: all lines occupied. We asked at security staff and at the front desk/reception desk, but they didn't know anything about it. They just said that usually if there's something in that room, there's a line of 50 people and today we were the only ones asking about it. We got nervous: half an hour later still nobody there, nobody in the building new what was going on, what was planned or had a phone number for the CIC Montreal office on Saint-Antoine. So we decided to go check out the office at Saint-Antoine (2 metro stations and a bit a walking further). After all the cranky personnel at Guy-Favreau we were relieved to find a very happy and comic security guard at the reception desk that pumped up our moral. He already heared our landing officer talk about people not showing up and that she realized she forgot to inform us about the change of address. So after 2 minutes in the waiting area, a woman showed up, pretty embarrassed, because indeed: she forgot to mention on the phone I would be the only one landing, so it wouldn't be at Guy-Favreau. At least we were happy that it didn't mean that we missed my landing and that the whole procedure was cancelled.
At her desk we had a very nice talk. We started in French, then she saw I'm from the Netherlands and checked if I didn't want to do this in English and she was very surprised when we answered that my French was good enough to do this whole thing in French. She was very nice, a lot of small talk. She had to take back the work permits, but when I asked if I could keep them for 'scrapbook purposes', she disappeared for almost 5 minutes to find some (the only) stamp in the building to "void" the OWP in order for me to keep it. So nice!
We talked about my experiences, the contact with CIC about the residency calculator, how call center agents can give contradicting responses, etc. She encouraged us to always write down the ID# of the agent and the date+time of the call, and that we could always ask for a supervisor on the phone in case answers don't match. All calls are recorded, so they can always trace everything back! From what she said, I understood that CIC Montreal has a part of the national call center in their building on the first floor. She couldn't give much more information, because she was only specilized in a small area.
So I got just two basic questions: do I have any kids inside or outside Canada and did I run into problems with justice. No kids anywhere and no problems with justice, so that was fine. She already checked our address before, when she did a final check with all the details on the CoPR. Then I got a smiley "Bienvenue au Canada" with a handshake and some little book (and she said it contains information that even my wife doesn't know yet, so I really have to quiz her!
Then I mentioned that so far I already won French Scrabble, so she started laughing and ended with a big "WOW!")
I think with all the chit-chat we spend about 10-15 minutes with her. She was very nice and energetic. It was great!
Then I had to rush to the airport to pick up my parents. She assured me I had plenty of time to get there, while she was bringing us back to the exit. Couldn't get the permanent SIN right away, since I missed the big meeting. They don't set up appointments with Service Canada for private landings. I'll need to wait for the PR card too (no 'biggie').
Ooh! (Since some people ask this question sometimes...) She also mentioned during the interview: it's impossible to travel and get back into Canada WITHOUT the PR card. If you do need to travel, you'll need to request a special visa at the local Canadian embassy or consulate for PR's without PR card. Even visa exempt citizens MUST have this visa, otherwise immigration will most likely deny entry. The CoPR is needed for the visa, but cannot just show that at the border: it doesn't allow re-entry without the visa.
Apart from that: keep the CoPR in a locker until at least 65 years old: you need it to get your Canadian pension!
So I hope everyone else will get a great landing agent, just like me.
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