Wednesday 18 May 2011

On a different note...

Application heaven!

Great News! No sooner had I clicked 'publish' on my last post than my phone started flashing like an old man at a bus stop. My other half has received his Letter of Introduction today - only two weeks after his application was forwarded to immigration (the expected wait is anything from 6 weeks up!)



This means that he could get a flight tomorrow, receive his work permit at immigration and start working straight away! Of course, this isn't our plan - but it's nice to know its in the bag. You have a year from the date of issue to enter Canada and receive your work permit so we have plenty of time to get everything in order.

I am still waiting for my LOI. As my application was forwarded to Immigration at the London Office a few days after his I am hopeful I wont be waiting too long!

Next job....flights and medical insurance.

Aimée L’amour x
www.twitter.com/aimeelamour

Application hell...

So today I find myself six weeks on from my last post and the pangs of guilt for not keeping it up to date have finally had effect. The last six weeks have been hectic for all kinds of reasons (nothing new there) and the next six dont seem to be slowing down either!

So whats been going on since my last post? Well the first thing that happened was that we recieved our police certificates back (no shaddy pasts here!) and I finaly got NatWest to sign my proof of funds form. That meant that all we had left to do was to make sure our application forms were complete and signed and send them off. Incomplete or incorrect applications are automatically denied - which meant an evening of obsesively checking applications for us. It didn't help that the IEC changed the forms mid way through us filling them in either! But such is life.

One Application

So we sent our applications of to the Canadian Embassy in Paris via Airsure at the Post Office which, we were assured, meant we could track our applications all the way to their destination. WRONG!

The estimated delivery time to France is 2-3 working days. By day 4, I was nervous. The online tracking on the Royal Mail website only told me that the package had been handed over to the French Postal Service and there was no other information. So I called Royal Mail to ask where my package was. The guy I spoke to told me that once it had been handed over to the French it couldnt be tracked at all and Royal Mail had no responsibility for it being delivered, the best I could do was put on my best French accent and pettit-pois my way through a conversation with La Poste.

Needless to say, I was less than impressed. Why did I just pay you £10 to track my item to Greater London, Royal Mail?hhhhhhmmmmmmmmm?
Luckily on 24th April, I recieved an email stating that my application had been received and I stopped harrassing Royal Mail.

Then on 3rd May I recieved another email stating that I had been accepted on the condition that I wire the visa fee of £90 into their French bank account within 10 days. Once again, NatWest failed me. I dont know why I was surprised, but surfice it to say that I am looking forward to taking my business and substantial overdraft elsewhere! Thank the Lord then for the lovely man in Barclays who rescued me with only a few days left to upload my proof of payment and not only asked why I was transfering the money and went through it all with me to make sure that I had included all of the mandatroy information on my reciept, but also waived the £25 fee because of the stress caused by other banks! What a lovely guy!

My proof of payment was recieved on 10th May and my application forwarded to the London High Commission for immigration to look at on 11th May. While all this has been going on my other half has been studying for exams and I have recently found out that I face redundancy. Although the last few weeks have shaken us up, made us question our initial plans and prompted me to start playing the lottery (so far I have won £5.70 - begginers luck) we are determined that we will make it on to that plane!

Aimée L’amour x
www.twitter.com/aimeelamour