If you are looking for insights on first landing experience and a month of Nov in Toronto, you can read through. I will be covering my flight departures, landing in YYZ, immigration, customs, finding a house to rent, job hunting.
We left end of October 2019 and flew with British Airways, we considered BA because it was cheaper, baggage allowance and you get a layover for about 3 hours half way through the journey. BA has this amazing feature where your cabin bag can weigh upto 23 kilos they just have restrictions on the baggage size, so you can put your heavy items in your cabin bag to make optimum space utilization. The crew were really great and I enjoyed my flight throughout *Highly recommended*. It departs Bangalore at 7AM and reaches Toronto around 7:40 PM EST and the layover does really give you some time to stretch your legs and back before your next long journey. Heathrow is a big airport and 3 hours passes by in a flash.
Once you reach Toronto, you will need to head towards immigration and they have these teller machines which asks for a series of questions and scans your passport and face and then gives you a slip, takes about a min or two for the process. After this you will be directed to immigration, you will be asked to declare any items if you have such as food, money, jewellery (I’m sure you would have read what is required and what is not) be honest while telling what you have. Time duration really depends on how many immigration officers are available at that time and how many immigrants are lined, for us it took about 40 mins. Keep all your papers handy as this will ease your process, the immigration officer will check your records and will not ask much if you have your documents handy, they will ask the address to where the PR card should be mailed. Once this is done, as you head out, you will find a “Service Canada” desk which closes around 8PM. If you happen to get in before that you will be given your Social Insurance Number, if you don’t then it’s okay as you can get it done next day from any “Service Canada” near your location. Since we reached post the closing time, we did not get our SIN on the same day. Once you move out, you will head to the baggage belt and most likely your baggage will not be on the belt, it will be removed and kept aside, so don’t panic just look around. At the exit of baggage you will find customs officers to whom you need to hand over the declaration slips, they don’t check all passengers and they may stop few to check if we have declared everything rite. There are taxis available at the exit of the airport and a coordinator will get you a taxi based on your luggage and how many people you are, this shouldn’t take more than couple of mins.
Day 1: We got a phone connection, try to get a post paid connection as this helps in your credit score and also serves as address proof, post this we went to a closest “Service Canada” for SIN and the process took us about 20 mins where they will explain you about the SIN with Dos and Don’ts (this is a free service, you do not have to pay)
If you are in a hurry to find a part time job until you get a permanent and full time employment, there are Employment centres available and they usually have a list of part time and full time jobs available for you to apply, make sure you carry few resume copies with you. This is again a free service.
Day 2: Get a Toronto Public Library membership, it’s free, but you will need to load some money into the card if you need to take print outs. Print outs are cheaper than outside, each side of print is 15 cents. You will be asked for an address proof, at this point you are most likely not to have any address proof, so your SIN will work, show them the SIN paper and your Passport for identification. You can use public library to browse your internet and they have a huge collection of books.
After this, it’s more about job hunting. While you do that, take some time out and explore the neighbourhood and talk to people. They are usually friendly when you approach with a smile
The biggest task now is to find a house. You usually will not find a house to rent unless you have a job in hand or if you know some real estate person who can help you out. You don’t have to pay the real estate person if they are finding you a house to rent, it’s usually the landlords who pay them commission. Work on your budget and location on where you need to stay, public transport in Toronto (TTC) is excellent and you don’t really need to hire a cab. Make sure you buy a Presto card and load some money if you are going to use TTC, effective Dec 1 2019 tickets and token system will be stopped in TTC, you can visit http://ttc.ca/ and https://www.prestocard.ca/en/ for info.
Job hunting is time consuming, make sure you have contacts before coming, it will only expedite the job-hunting process and keep your LinkedIn profile updated. You can use Linkdin or Indeed for job hunting. Interview process usually takes about 3-4 weeks, if your profile is shortlisted they will have a tele round and then you will be given an online test which is mainly to check your aptitude and personality, if you crack this, you will be given a date and time for the interview and once you are selected you will be given an offer to negotiate. For starters an annual CTC of 50 to 65k is usually the average. Be on time for your interview, be formal and check with the Talent Acquisition person if you need more clarity as it may vary from role to role.
With all this said, some prerequisites before you come:
· AirBnB: Select your AirBnB wisely, check if there are TTC routes available. Some AirBnB may be cheap, but would not have access to TTC and thus commuting will be a task
· Money: I loaded my money on my Forex so it’s easier to pay, usually everyone accepts cards even if the payment is for $1. Even cabs do..! However, find your convenient way. I would say about 18k CAD will get you going for about 4-5 months without any income, considering practical spends
· Have a big dream, but do not have any expectations. Be open for anything as life hits a refresh when you are here
· Try to make some contacts, it may ease things for you
· You will find people with different cultures and nations, be open in talking to them and leave the hatred of different nations behind
· Pack your loved sealed food which can sustain you for a month, though you get everything here but, you may want to save some bucks during your initial days.
Feel free to leave a comment below if you have any questions, I will be happy to suggest. All the best with the process.
We left end of October 2019 and flew with British Airways, we considered BA because it was cheaper, baggage allowance and you get a layover for about 3 hours half way through the journey. BA has this amazing feature where your cabin bag can weigh upto 23 kilos they just have restrictions on the baggage size, so you can put your heavy items in your cabin bag to make optimum space utilization. The crew were really great and I enjoyed my flight throughout *Highly recommended*. It departs Bangalore at 7AM and reaches Toronto around 7:40 PM EST and the layover does really give you some time to stretch your legs and back before your next long journey. Heathrow is a big airport and 3 hours passes by in a flash.
Once you reach Toronto, you will need to head towards immigration and they have these teller machines which asks for a series of questions and scans your passport and face and then gives you a slip, takes about a min or two for the process. After this you will be directed to immigration, you will be asked to declare any items if you have such as food, money, jewellery (I’m sure you would have read what is required and what is not) be honest while telling what you have. Time duration really depends on how many immigration officers are available at that time and how many immigrants are lined, for us it took about 40 mins. Keep all your papers handy as this will ease your process, the immigration officer will check your records and will not ask much if you have your documents handy, they will ask the address to where the PR card should be mailed. Once this is done, as you head out, you will find a “Service Canada” desk which closes around 8PM. If you happen to get in before that you will be given your Social Insurance Number, if you don’t then it’s okay as you can get it done next day from any “Service Canada” near your location. Since we reached post the closing time, we did not get our SIN on the same day. Once you move out, you will head to the baggage belt and most likely your baggage will not be on the belt, it will be removed and kept aside, so don’t panic just look around. At the exit of baggage you will find customs officers to whom you need to hand over the declaration slips, they don’t check all passengers and they may stop few to check if we have declared everything rite. There are taxis available at the exit of the airport and a coordinator will get you a taxi based on your luggage and how many people you are, this shouldn’t take more than couple of mins.
Day 1: We got a phone connection, try to get a post paid connection as this helps in your credit score and also serves as address proof, post this we went to a closest “Service Canada” for SIN and the process took us about 20 mins where they will explain you about the SIN with Dos and Don’ts (this is a free service, you do not have to pay)
If you are in a hurry to find a part time job until you get a permanent and full time employment, there are Employment centres available and they usually have a list of part time and full time jobs available for you to apply, make sure you carry few resume copies with you. This is again a free service.
Day 2: Get a Toronto Public Library membership, it’s free, but you will need to load some money into the card if you need to take print outs. Print outs are cheaper than outside, each side of print is 15 cents. You will be asked for an address proof, at this point you are most likely not to have any address proof, so your SIN will work, show them the SIN paper and your Passport for identification. You can use public library to browse your internet and they have a huge collection of books.
After this, it’s more about job hunting. While you do that, take some time out and explore the neighbourhood and talk to people. They are usually friendly when you approach with a smile
The biggest task now is to find a house. You usually will not find a house to rent unless you have a job in hand or if you know some real estate person who can help you out. You don’t have to pay the real estate person if they are finding you a house to rent, it’s usually the landlords who pay them commission. Work on your budget and location on where you need to stay, public transport in Toronto (TTC) is excellent and you don’t really need to hire a cab. Make sure you buy a Presto card and load some money if you are going to use TTC, effective Dec 1 2019 tickets and token system will be stopped in TTC, you can visit http://ttc.ca/ and https://www.prestocard.ca/en/ for info.
Job hunting is time consuming, make sure you have contacts before coming, it will only expedite the job-hunting process and keep your LinkedIn profile updated. You can use Linkdin or Indeed for job hunting. Interview process usually takes about 3-4 weeks, if your profile is shortlisted they will have a tele round and then you will be given an online test which is mainly to check your aptitude and personality, if you crack this, you will be given a date and time for the interview and once you are selected you will be given an offer to negotiate. For starters an annual CTC of 50 to 65k is usually the average. Be on time for your interview, be formal and check with the Talent Acquisition person if you need more clarity as it may vary from role to role.
With all this said, some prerequisites before you come:
· AirBnB: Select your AirBnB wisely, check if there are TTC routes available. Some AirBnB may be cheap, but would not have access to TTC and thus commuting will be a task
· Money: I loaded my money on my Forex so it’s easier to pay, usually everyone accepts cards even if the payment is for $1. Even cabs do..! However, find your convenient way. I would say about 18k CAD will get you going for about 4-5 months without any income, considering practical spends
· Have a big dream, but do not have any expectations. Be open for anything as life hits a refresh when you are here
· Try to make some contacts, it may ease things for you
· You will find people with different cultures and nations, be open in talking to them and leave the hatred of different nations behind
· Pack your loved sealed food which can sustain you for a month, though you get everything here but, you may want to save some bucks during your initial days.
Feel free to leave a comment below if you have any questions, I will be happy to suggest. All the best with the process.
