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Hi guys,durgaprasanth wrote: I think there is a delay of 5-10 working days due to the change in payment collection service provider.
WOW atleast someone has got good news...Golauk wrote:Friends , I got my HSMP extension which is upto 2010.
The timeline was
Application recd. by HO 29 June 2006
Payment charged 11 July 2006
Ref No. Received 12 July 2006
Passport with visas recd. 14 July 2006
They are now deciding cases very fast
GolaUK
rose99 wrote:Hi,
I've sent my papers and application exactly 2 months before my HSMP visa expired and, according to this forum, many other had done the same as well, and the applications were approved + extensions granted. Here is my timeline (note: I am exempt from paying fees due to one of my nationalities but still my application had to go through the fee charging team):
- HSMP visa expiry date: Aug. 30, 2006
- sent FLR (IED) application (by Special delivery): July 1, 2006
- application received by Home Office (fee charging team): July 4, 2006
- received confirmation letter (dated July 12, 2006) and ref. number: July 14, 2006
- phoned Home Office and learnt that my application had been approved: July 20, 2006
- documents arrived (by Special Delivery): July 22, 2006.
- visa granted until August 30, 2010.
Here in London I work in one of my specializations as a manager (I have two university degrees, two postgraduate diplomas and an MBA, and have several professions that I can pursue), my husband works as a manager in his profession (IT) as well, and we are extremely happy with our decission to come to the UK (from Canada) on this HSMP program. We find this opportunity and so far experience much better than it was our experience of immigrants in Canada for almost 10 years (before coming to the UK).
Thank you all for your sharing, guidance and general attitudes. Good luck with your visas and extensions!
Rose
rose99 wrote:Hi Simar,
To answer your question about Canada and if we put aside my own feelings about the culture and ways of life in North America in general, the main problem for immigrants in Canada is that Canadian businesses/professional circles do not recognize your previous education and experience and don't bother reading your resume, no matter how many points you've got in the immigration process for visa purposes and how much you have been checked by the Canadian counsulate prior to getting a visa or where you've worked previously. What they are looking for is that infamous "Canadian experience" that every employer wants to see on the resume, and they don't care that you've worked for the best corporations in the world for a certain field - they care only about the Canadian experience. I also have to say that this is not only a problem for immigrants but is also for Canadians who dared to live abroad for years working or studying and when they finally come back home, there are no jobs for them and their education and experience are not valid enough for the employers. I did my master thesis in Canada on that topic and always say that I feel very dissapointed in how Canada treats its highly skilled immigrants. It is not just me - there are also Canadians that are now trying to change the overall attitude, but that is not working as fast as it should... You can read a lot about that on the web (www.notcanada.com first comes to mind and whatever you read there is what I have also experienced with my family). It is also interesting to point out that no other country with such a high immigration influx (such as Australia, US, UK, Holland, Germany, France, Sweden, Norway) has such a bad reputation on the web/print/TV (surprisingly Canadian TV mostly) when it comes to how its immigrants are treated once when they land and become residents. I followed these sentiments for two years prior to writing my master thesis and although you can find some negative comments about other countries as well (which is natural as everybody has different opinions) it is Canada (a country that advertises itself as a country with best living standard in the world and that boasts about UN ratings related to that) that is widely commented on in negative terms. It is also interesting to say that even the Canadian Government officially recognizes the problem with how the highly skilled immigrants are treated and for the past 2-3 years is trying to change the situation among the business/professional communities, but it is very obvious that it is not successful and that it is very hard to change the overall business/professional (homophobic) culture that exists there.
I have to say that Canada has a great system of integrating its immigrants in terms of language skills for example (if you look at the UK in that way, it is horrible as it does not have any free English as a Second Language (ESL) courses like Canada does), or helping them with making their job applications/resumes, but when it finally comes to finding appropriate job, most highly skilled immigrants end up sweeping floors, delivering pizzas, driving cabs or becoming child-day-care providers at their own homes. What a waste of tallent, particularly when Canada has not paid a cent for the education of those immigrants. Also, most of those highly skilled immigrants usualy don't need an extra English language training, so in my opinion the money that the Canadian government spends in that area should have been spent somewhere else.
For some time I used to work in the adult education centre in a town in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) where those highly skilled immigrants come in thousands to upgrade their language and other skills hoping to find decent jobs and I know their backgrounds, problems they encountered in Canada, and many of them personally. I've met too many PhDs who ended in menial jobs and it is a big disgrace. It really doesn't matter if your background is from Asia, Africa or Europe, as I've met too many engineers from India, from France, Germany, Russia, China, teachers from Holland, professors from Italy, doctors from all over the world... who couldn't work in their professions in Canada. There is a story, widely reported in Canadian media, about a Chinese scientist (a lady) who has been a part of the crew that had sent the first Chinese astronaut to space and who now sells doghnuts in the Toronto subway. She was featured by all major Canadian newspapers and was on a TV several times telling her story in order to open the eyes of the Canadian society and the problem it has with how it treats its highly skilled immigrants. As a manager at the adult education centre I attended several conferences where one of the topics was this particular problem, and I've met Joe Volpe, former Labour and Immigration minister, and no matter how interested he was to push the stereotips away, it proved to be a hard job and is still not solved.
I have to say that some of highly skilled immigrants managed to get through the red tape, and after certain certification exams managed to work in their own profession, but those are only few lucky ones. I used to be one of them, as I've got a job in my field, although on a much lower position than I used to have had before coming to Canada. As I am very persistant and speak languages, + I graduated from Canadian universities in the meantime (on top of my previous university education gained in my original country), I managed to be promoted to a management role... My own husband (an engineer) worked as pizza driver for two years. The reason why I have so many degrees and diplomas is exactly that situation as I didn't want to end up like most other immigrants and as a result I used to be a full time university student and a full time employee (and finally a manager) for the last six years in Canada. Very exhausting if you know that we have also a family to raise and feed. My husband did the same (during about two years we were both full time students, employed and were raising three small children at the same time), and finally managed to excel in his field as well, but we've lost too many years in the process and instead of growing professionally, we had to go back to school all over again. Most immigrants in Canada are reluctant to do that and instead stay in their odd jobs in order to be able to feed their families. If you ask any Canadian if they would like to move to another country and have to go to school from scratch they would think you're crazy, but they (in a way) ask that of their own immigrants or otherwise the immigrants end up doing jobs that Canadians don't want to do and I am very bitter about that.
On the other hand, that experience was extremely helpful for upgrading my education and overall knowledge and skills, but I used to feel degraded too many times and didn't want to live in the society that allows that. As we are Europeans anyway, we decided to move back to Europe and the HSMP programme proved to be a right move for us. I am still very bitter about how we were treated in Canada as professionals, but here in the UK feel very free to say that I feel welcome in many ways. If we put aside the Home Office change of rules re: ILR, everything else (for us) was much better experience than in Canada. My husband got a management position (IT) only after 5 days of looking for work, and I managed to do the same (as I was very picky) after two months. My British colleagues do not question my qualifications nor treat me as a person that is an immigrant and that needs to learn "the ways of this society" as many Canadians constantly try to put on every immigrant (no matter how long one has lived in the country). I feel more comfortable and more accepted here in the UK where everybody goes about their own business, don't have time to think about who is an immigrant and who is not, where I am not constantly reminded that I am an immigrant, and where I am accepted professionally. As a last point, here in the UK I feel that people value education much better than that is the case with Canada, and Canadians really don't have that much to boast education-wise as my Canadian university courses felt like high school courses in my country - they were that easy and simple.
I hope this will help you and wish you luck with whatever you decide to do.
Rose
