Well, now when I can breathe again: we also just had an interview and it was pretty interesting experience. To begin with, it looks like the interviewing officer didn't know anything about our application. She was genuinely unaware of the details that were listed in the application (I'd say unaware of everything actually
) and it looked like she was randomly picked to conduct an interview. First she asked to present all the evidences of our relationship that we'd gathered and taken to the interview. Most of them were shown through the glass window and some she requested to pass to her. An interpreter was also present and sitting next to the officer.
The questions were pretty standard, about a sponsor (date of birth, place of living, work) and about relationship (how and where we met, how the wedding went, etc.). All took an hour or a bit longer. Then the officer said that she would be the person who would make a decision. Then she spoke about something else for just a couple of minutes and right after that she said that she was convinced in the genuineness of our relationship and she would be approving an application. She informed that usually it's up to Warsaw to issue a visa and COPR, but if everything she needed was in the file, she could issue a visa right away. Then she went through the file and it turned out everything was in place. The visa and COPR was issued 20 minutes later (which was my dream but I couldn't believe that could actually happen).
After checking an online account later the day we found the status of the application was changed to "Approved". Pre-arrival came only after that. So, our "decision made" process was kind of upside down
First COPR in hand and only then decision made on ECAS and a pre-arrival
Now, it was interesting to watch how the decision was being made and how she was going through the paper file.
@JoshC as we all discussed long ago about "Security check in progress" and how much time it takes, here's what I can say based on my observations. I ordered GCMS notes long ago and they showed that Security was passed based on fingerprints (no matches have been found in Canada or the US), and criminality didn't start. Later I happened to order notes again and they came right before the interview. I could see there that the criminality didn't start yet. And on the interview the officer after making the decision was going through the file and checking if the police certificate was there. It obviously was and then she asked a couple of questions if there was no link with the government and having heard answers she was satisfied with that. So... To me it looks like that Criminality check is actually just a clean police certificate and all checkboxes marked as "no" in the form where there are questions like if you are a part of any party or terrorist organization or something. It looks like that's enough for them and they don't do anything else and in reality there's no "criminality check" (as rumors say it takes months which is now I think is not true).
At last, the GCMS notes were saying that the officer in Warsaw reviewed the file a few weeks before the interview and was satisfied that the relationship was genuine. So the reason of the interview is unknown to me, if they were already satisfied...
