Citizenship certification

[Philicia]

I am a Status Canadian Mohawk that was born in the U.S prior to 1970 and still live there. ... my father and his mother are both Canadians. I applied for my citizenship certification and it has been about 17 months now since my application was acknowledge that it was received. Why is this taking longer than the 5 months touted online at Canada.ca ??? ... is it related to the backlog of more pressing emergency immigration matters that have been slowly being resolved? I inquired about my application online and was basically told I will know when I know???

 

[hawk39]

Your application probably got sent to Program Support for further review; you should have gotten a Notice of Delay in your e-mail. You should check your spam filter.

 

[Philicia]

I did get a letter in the mail of notice of delay last October. And it was in April when I inquired via e-mail and received a response that more or less said we will let you know when we let you know. ??? This is very frustrating as I was given no reason for the delay? Nor was I asked for any further documentation. Perhaps I should e-mail them an inquiry on a regular basis until I receive a response? I already have PR status as a Canadian Mohawk but that doesn’t always mean one also has citizenship which is why I applied to certify that. They have not said “No” which I guess is positive. Thanks for the response.

 

[hawk39]

I did get a letter in the mail of notice of delay last October. And it was in April when I inquired via e-mail and received a response that more or less said we will let you know when we let you know. ??? This is very frustrating as I was given no reason for the delay? Nor was I asked for any further documentation. Perhaps I should e-mail them an inquiry on a regular basis until I receive a response? I already have PR status as a Canadian Mohawk but that doesn’t always mean one also has citizenship which is why I applied to certify that. They have not said “No” which I guess is positive. Thanks for the response.

If you did get a Notice of Delay, then you would have been told in it that the 5-month processing timeframe is not applicable. You will just have to be patient and wait for them to get to your application. Badgering them with inquiries will not make them go any faster; they do keep track of how many times and how frequently you contact them. My application sat in Program Support for 24 months before I got a request for more corroboration to support my claim; after submitting the requested information, my application was approved a week later. Here's my timeline if you're interested:

1. We received your application for a citizenship certificate (proof of Canadian citizenship) on June 8, 2017.
2. We sent you correspondence acknowledging receipt of your application(s) on July 5, 2017.
3. We started processing your application on July 20, 2017.
4. We sent you a letter on October 3, 2017. Please consider delays in mail delivery before contacting us.
5. We sent your citizenship certificate on August 7, 2019 to 'your address'. If your certificate was sent to a Canadian embassy, high commission or consulate, you will be contacted when it arrives. Mailing times will vary by region and could take up to four months. If we have sent your certificate to the wrong address, please contact us.

My letter was dated the same day when processing began, but I received it in my e-mail on October 3. So my application really sat in Program Support for 2 years.

 

[Philicia]

Thanks for the response. I’ll guess I’ll wait till it hits the two year mark... it would be nice if they said on the website 2 yers instead of 5 months... then I wouldn’t be worried about it.