Tell us three things and we can usually give you a first answer
Where the candidate holds citizenship. Not where they live. Not where they work now. This one fact opens or closes more routes than anything else, and it is the one employers most often assume does not matter.
What they will actually do all day. Not the title on the job posting. The duties.
When you want them to start. This is the constraint we work backwards from, and it is the one most often decided before anyone checks whether it is achievable.
That is enough to tell you which of your candidates is straightforward, which is slow, and which one needs a different plan. It is a short conversation, and it is worth having before the offer is signed rather than after.
Where these hires actually go wrong
Not in the law. In four places, and all of them are avoidable.
- The offer letter was written for your applicant tracking system. "Senior AI Engineer, Level 5" tells an officer nothing. The decision turns on what the person does, matched against a list of occupations written decades before your role existed. Whoever drafts your offer letters is, without knowing it, drafting the most important document in the application.
- The start date was committed before anyone checked the route. Different routes move at genuinely different speeds. Choosing the date first and the route second is the most expensive ordinary mistake in this area, because the cost lands on your candidate, who has another offer.
- Nobody told the company what it was signing. Hiring from abroad without a labour market assessment still means your company files an offer of employment with the federal government, and that filing creates obligations about wages, working conditions and record keeping that your company can be inspected against. It is a real commitment, and it is usually made by someone who does not know they are making it.
- You found out late. Every problem above is cheap in the week before the offer and expensive in the month after it.
Your candidate's passport decides most of this
Here is the whole map, and it is shorter than you would expect.
A US or Mexican citizen
There is a route under the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement, still called a TN permit by nearly everyone, that skips the labour market assessment entirely. It is the quickest way in and also the narrowest: it turns on citizenship and on a closed list of occupations. Whether your role fits is a real question with a real answer, and we can give you that answer from the job description.
Anyone else, including your contractor in Berlin
That route is closed to them, and no amount of seniority or salary opens it. This is where most technology hires actually go: an expedited stream built for exactly this, which does involve a labour market assessment but runs on a published service standard and matches roles by occupation code rather than by a fixed list.
The route for everyone else →Someone already on your payroll abroad
A transfer inside your own company may be simpler than either of the above, whatever passport they hold. It also carries a ceiling on total time in Canada, which matters if you intend to keep the person, and which is far easier to plan for now than to discover in year five.
If you are the founder and the hire is you, the answer is different again, and the way your Canadian company is structured changes it. That is worth raising before the company is set up, not after.
If you would rather check the reasoning yourself, the rules behind each of these routes, including the occupation lists, the credential thresholds, the duration limits and the ceiling on transfers, are set out on our resources page.
What we do, and when
The work that decides these files happens before the offer goes out, which is also when it is cheapest.
- Before the offer. We check citizenship against the available routes, map the real duties to an occupation, and tell you whether the credential holds up. If the answer is no, this is the week to know.
- The offer letter and job description, written so the duties carry the application rather than the internal title.
- The government filing. The offer of employment, filed correctly, with the obligations it creates explained to you before you take them on rather than after an inspection.
- The application itself, and briefing your candidate on what to expect and what to carry.
- The alternative, told to you straight, when the route you were planning on is not available. That answer is more useful in the first call than in month three.
Fees for this work are published with everything else on the fees page, under Employers and business. Government fees and the employer compliance fee are additional, and your fee is confirmed in a written retainer before any work begins.
Questions employers actually ask
Our candidate is a contractor in Berlin. Can we use the fast route?
No. That route is open to US and Mexican citizens only, and citizenship is the test, not residence or skill. For a German national the usual answer is the Global Talent Stream. If they already work for your company abroad, a transfer may be quicker than either.
Can we just send them to the border?
Sometimes, depending on the route and the candidate's nationality, and it is genuinely quick when it is available. It is also one officer, once, on the strength of what your candidate is carrying. A refusal there is not a neutral outcome, and it is not something you want a new hire to experience in their first week with you. Whether it is the right choice is a decision about the specific file.
How long does this take?
It depends on the route, and we are not going to print a number here that we cannot stand behind for your file. What we can do early is tell you which routes are realistic for your start date, which is the version of the answer you can actually plan with.
What do we tell the candidate about their spouse?
Nothing yet. Family members are dealt with under the ordinary immigration rules rather than as an automatic benefit of the worker's route, and the rules on open work permits for spouses have tightened. Treat it as a question to get answered, not a benefit to offer in a recruiting conversation.
Our role is called "Machine Learning Engineer". Does that exist?
Not under that name, on the list that matters for the fastest route. The lists in this area were written before the job was invented. What counts is the duties, which is why the job description matters more than the title, and why this is worth checking before the offer letter is signed.
What happens if they change teams after they arrive?
Ask us first. Most work permits name the employer and the occupation, so an internal move that changes what the person actually does can require a new permit. It is a straightforward thing to handle in advance and an awkward one to discover during an audit.
What is our company on the hook for?
If you file an offer of employment, you commit to the wage and the working conditions you described, and to keeping records that show it. Employers can be inspected against those commitments. Whoever owns compliance in your organisation should see the filing before it goes in.
Tell us about the hire
Citizenship, the role, and what the person will actually do. That is usually enough for a first answer on which route applies and whether the one you were planning on is available to you.
Ask about a hireWe can control how the file is built, how the duties are described and evidenced, and whether your obligations are met. We cannot control the decision, which belongs to an officer, and no preparation guarantees an approval. What preparation does is make sure the answer turns on your candidate rather than on your paperwork.
General legal information for employers, not legal advice about your hire. Eligibility turns on the individual's citizenship and credentials and on the duties of the specific role. Requirements and government fees change. Confirm current requirements before relying on anything here.