Permanent Residence Application and Work Permit

[DavidSusy]

Hello,

I have been attempting to start the permanent residence process for my wife who is still in mexico at the moment. we were married in August and have been trying to start the paper work to apply from outside of Canada. Unfortunatly we have been having so many problems, with the medical doctor that was LISTED on the CIC website, who first had no idea what medical forms he was required to give my wife, and then told her she didn't need Copy 2 of the medical forms. and now we have been back and forth trying to get this document now that they finalyl figured out which one it was they ended up mailing it to canada instead of giving it to her. So I dunno what to do. If I can file a complaint or anything??

But I think we are just going to try applying from within canada. I was just wondering if anyone could help me with some questions.
1. Can my wife simply apply for a tourist visa and once she is here we can apply for permanent residence?
2. How does the work permit work? can she apply for this at the same time as the permanent residence. or does she have to wait to apply for it? and how long does it normally take to be issued?

Thanks to anyone who could help me with some answers to my questions! as you can imagine the issues with the doctor have been very stressful. It just doesn't make sense to me how they can be approved on the CIC website. and she had to travel 4.5 hours to go see the doctor as he was the closest to her location and he doesn't even know what he's doing.

anyways.

Cheers!

Dave

[DavidSusy]

I apologize for the venting. sometimes you just have to get things off your chest.

But would anyone be able to help me with my questions?
I'm unsure how sponsoring my spouse from within Canada works. I am a Canadian Citizen and we have an abundant amount of proof of our relationship. Would she just need to get a tourist visa to come to canada and then we simply apply for PR and she stays?
And would it take about 5 to 6 months before she could get a work permit?


Thanks!

[Suin]

hello,
try to read info on this link
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/information/applications/spouse.asp

she can also try to apply for the visitor's visa, though it will be quite difficult for her being your wife to receive it.

good luck

[mitamata]

She can try to apply for a visitor visa, but unless she's able to prove she has stronger times with home than with Canada, she will not get one - they will not give a visa if they suspect that the person intends to stay in Canada. And with a husband in Canada, that will be hard to prove. But it doesn't hurt if you try :)

There are two types of applications, inland and outland. Inland is processed in Canada, outland is processed in the visa office responsible for the country your wife is from. For an inland application, your wife has to be in Canada - if she leaves Canada and is unable to return (if for example she doesn't get another visa) to attend the landing interview, then you lose the application and you have to apply again.
You can file an outland application no matter where your wife is, in Canada or not.

An open work permit is available with an inland application - you apply for it at the same time you apply for your wife's PR. If you get approval in principle, then she'll likely get the work permit as well. It takes 5-6 months for Vegreville to get to this point. After that, it can take a month or a year to finish processing, depending on if and where your file is transfered - they transfer it to the local CIC office and some are busier than others. While waiting for this, she would have to keep getting her visitor's status extended.

Personally, I would recommend you start looking into an outland application, so this one.

[DavidSusy]

Hi, yes we have actually been trying to do the outland application for PR. And we have everything except for the medical report. What happened is we looked on the CIC website for the designated medical practitioners. and she went to the closest one to her. which is still almost 5 hours away. so it was a whole day there and back. Anyways. she had all the tests done and paid for, and she is supposed to recieve a Copy 2 of the medical report section-A it states in the application form. But when she asked the doctor he told her that she didn't need any forms. she asked repeatedly and he told her that he must send everything to canada and that she doesn't get anything. she told me this once she returned to her house. and i called the immigration office and they told me that no the doctor must give her the Copy 2. so we called the doctors office in mexico and they still had no idea what form this was. So I looked online for a picture of what the form looks like and sent it to them. They finally found the forms. and said that she would need to travel there so that she could sign it. We asked them if they could mail it to her instead and she would mail it back. they agreed. so the form was mailed and signed. and mailed back to the doctors office for the doctor to sign. they told her they would mail her back the copy 2. but still have not. finally they said they did mail it and sent her a tracking number however it turns out they sent it with the rest of the documents and the tracking number is showing spain. ???
This is why I don't know what to do now? the designated medical practioner apparantly has no idea what they are doing in this process and my wife still doesn't have the Copy 2 the only form we need. and its been a month now.
That is why I was wondering if i wanted to sponser her from inside canada, how do i go about getting her here? is there a different visa I apply for then besides the temporary resident one?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!! thanks!! :)

[mitamata]

If she can't get the visitor visa, then you would need to get her in somehow else, but that would have nothing to do with you. She could immigrate as a skilled worker (which takes quite a while) or maybe enrol in a college in Canada and get a study permit. There's some other possibilites, but none are very quick. Hence the recommendation for the outland application, which I think is probably your only choice.

I had some not so good experience with the DMP here as well. They wouldn't do the medical because they said I need some forms from the embassy. It took 2 weeks of arguing with them to convince them that THEY have those forms. It seems some DMPs just rarely deal with spousal immigration and don't really know what to do in such cases. So I feel your pain. Though wow, what on earth are those documents doing in Spain? O_o What address did they send them to? Was it maybe Port of Spain?