Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) quietly published its latest application-inventory data late on 25 September, showing 2,092,700 files in its system across temporary residence, permanent residence and citizenship programs. Of these, 941,400—almost 45 per cent—have waited longer than the department’s published service standards. The ballooning inventory is driven chiefly by permanent-residence demand. IRCC reports 1,007,400 permanent-residence applications in process; roughly half are now outside service standards as annual admissions caps collide with unprecedented interest in economic, family-class and refugee pathways. Temporary-resident volumes remain high as well: more than 1.8 million visitor, work-permit and study-permit decisions have been issued since January, but 394,000 files were still in the system at the time of the report. For employers and newcomers, the numbers translate into longer, less-predictable timelines. Labour-market strategies that rely on the Global Skills Stream or other employer-driven work-permit categories continue to move faster than most permanent-residence routes, so companies are advised to build bridging-work-permit or intra-company-transfer options into their mobility planning. Applicants are urged to monitor online accounts daily, provide documents quickly and expect file transfers between offices as IRCC reallocates workloads. The department says it is prioritising economic streams aligned with skills shortages and is beta-testing a new digital processing platform for Express Entry that promises real-time status updates. Until that system is fully deployed, stakeholders should assume continued variability in processing and consider staggered start dates and contingency visa plans for key talent.
Source: CTC News
