INTERVIEW: Test-Event - ID/Documents Verification

I have seen multiple reports here of oath invitations given on the same day as the test/interview. Which contradicts some statements here that interviewer and decision maker are different people, or that there is a "standard" between various CIC offices in terms of processing steps.

kisunja85 wrote: Just had my test yesterday in Edmonton. Surprisingly, the lady conducting my interview explicitly told me that my documents have not been really reviewed yet and she has not seen them before either. Apart from standard questions (do you rent or own? where do you work?) the interview was more of a id and passport stamp verification event. At the end, she told me that I would be contacted should questions about my docs arise. One the one hand, the procedure makes sense: make the citizenship officer touch all the docs ONCE and have all evidence, tests included, to make a decision. But for me, it also means that I might expect an unwanted surprise in the mail (a.k.a. RQ-lite) and that is not nice. is not nice.

kisunja85 wrote: canuck 25, I did not know I was a majority :) My friends who had had the test this summer definitely had their files reviewed and the questioning was extensive. 2-4 months until the oath is the timeline I was given, and I am fine with it. I just hope there would be no delays beyond that.

It may be that many or even most applicants are told something which, in effect, suggests that their documents have not been reviewed, but it is almost certain that the file, including documents submitted by the applicant, are screened multple times prior to the test event itself, including a specific pre-interview check, which among other things is specifically mandated so that interviewers will be able, where appropriate, to better address and resolve potential issues through questions at the interview.

The interview you describe is very similar to the interview most often described, including my own.

It is most likely that the statement about the documents not having been really reviewed is in reference to the review to be done by a decision-maker. The interviewer is not a decision-maker (usually), just an information-gatherer. The interviewer has undoubtedly (if the interviewer was doing his or her job) reviewed the file, but not in a decision-making or assessment mode, rather in a mode to identify whether there are questions, in addition to the standard ones (set out in the FRC), which could help the decision-maker assess the applicant.

Once the interviewer has gathered the relevant information (including responses to questions at the interview), the file, with the interviewer's notes, goes to a decision-maker for a review which will be an assessment of the applicant's qualifications, including residency.

That is, regardless of what impression the interviewer gave you, it is almost certain that your application was indeed substantively examined prior to the interview, and probably by the person who interviewed you, but not assessed per se, or in a decision-making sense "reviewed."

(My sense is that many interviewers have a style in which they deliberately convey a degree of detachment, in large part because they really are detached from evaluating the applicant or the applicant's documents, their role being to gather information not judge it.)

Good luck.



Interview and Related Procedures Revisited
We have not seen a copy of the File Requirements Checklist more recent than the one in use in the summer of 2012, and of course we know that OB 407 (which included that version of the FRC) has been amended multiple times since then, but the basic outline of procedure reflected in that version of the FRC is almost certainly still the one in use.

I say that recognizing that aspects of the currently used version of the FRC are certainly different in some important respects due to new procedural provisions which took effect August 1st. But, there is little or no reason to suspect that there has been any major change to the pre-test and interview procedure.

That procedure mandates a pre-interview check, and among its overt purposes (as reflected in the OB and in CIC memos discussing its implementation) is to prepare the interviewer for the interview.

Additionally, there was a review of the application done in Sydney before the file was transferred to the local office; while the purpose of that review is to determine whether a pre-test RQ should be issued, it is nonetheless a review of the file resulting in some notations entered into the FRC (which stays with the file).

With only one known exception (the one that provided us with a copy of the FRC back in 2012), it is my impression that CIC does not release a copy of the FRC to applicants (even if specifically requested in an ATIP application), so applicants do not have access to any of the notations entered in the FRC attendant that initial review in Sydney, nor in the pre-interview check, nor even the interview itself (the FRC has check boxes for all these review steps, as well as spaces to enter narrative comments). All the applicant is given in response to an ATIP application, relative to the FRC, is the concluding notations entered in GCMS . . . even if the applicant specifically requests the physical file.

It appears to be correct (though this may vary from local office to local office) that the interviewer is usually NOT a decision-maker but is an information-gatherer. The interviewer's review of the file in the pre-interview check, for example, is not to draw any conclusions about the applicant's qualifications, but rather to organize and sort the information, identify potential issues, identify questions to be asked of particular applicants at the interview. Then this person should be the one, ordinarily, to conduct the interview, but the extent to which this is done is unknown. The interviewer then compiles the information obtained, and that is in turn submitted to the decision-maker. Whether or not the decision-maker, at that stage, is a Citizenship Officer or not we do not know. And, in particular, it is most likely at this step that the new procedure adopted in June, taking effect August 1st, takes over.

If the file is then reviewed by a Citizenship Officer, there will be a decision to grant citizenship or to pursue further processing (ranging from investigations to RQ, or specific requests for addtional documents, called RQ-lite by some but such requests can be about matters other than residency and thus are not always a RQ-lite . . . they can related to identity or potential criminal or security issues, among other purposes).

It is possible, quite feasible actually, that the decision-maker at that step is not a Citizenship Officer, but someone in a position with some decision-making authority, and the decision they make is whether to track the application for approval by a Citizenship Officer or to track it for further processing.

For what applicants see, it does not make that much of a difference. Following the interview most routinely processed applicants will have their applications approved and be scheduled for the oath . . . some sooner than others, but most within a matter of days, weeks, or a few months at most. Some applicants, however, will not be summarily approved in this way and so the timeline after the interview will vary greatly. Not every wrinkle in the procedure at this stage will necessarily cause a big delay, but some will. We have seen reports from some applicants given follow-up document requests, after the test, who were nonetheless scheduled for the oath within a few months. And we have seen more than a few whose case still loiters on the darkside of an indefinite timeline with little information about how long it is likely to be.

Note: It may make sense, as you say, that the procedure is to "make the citizenship officer touch all the docs ONCE and have all evidence, tests included, to make a decision . . . "

But, CIC has trended toward multiple review steps for a number of reasons. CIC is careful to distinguish the one-step decision-making from a process of many steps involving an examination (which I would call a "review") of the file in the course of preparing it to be submitted to the decision-maker.

In particular, as I outline above, my sense is that the one step review is in fact done, when it comes to decision-making, such that a Citizenship Officer probably does not even see a file until all the information gathering steps are complete. But again there are nonetheless multiple steps involving some review of the file, including documents, along the way to that stage.

There are legal reasons why CIC consolidates the decision-making into such a single step, a big one being that an applicant is entitled to see everything the decision-maker sees and considers in making the decision. CIC does not want to share with the applicant what it does with the file in its processing steps, what intermediate processing decisions are made or the basis for them.

The ATIP provisions run into a wall, a closed-curtain, since CIC does not need to divulge its investigatory methods or tools. Thus, for example, it appears that the one known exception to CIC releasing a copy of an applicant's FRC was an oversight, not to be repeated. My sense is that CIC has, deliberately, effectively rendered the ATIP process quite useless except in certain limited circumstances.

kisunja85 wrote: Just had my test yesterday in Edmonton. Surprisingly, the lady conducting my interview explicitly told me that my documents have not been really reviewed yet and she has not seen them before either. Apart from standard questions (do you rent or own? where do you work?) the interview was more of a id and passport stamp verification event. At the end, she told me that I would be contacted should questions about my docs arise.  One the one hand, the procedure makes sense: make the citizenship officer touch all the docs ONCE and have all evidence, tests included, to make a decision.  But for me, it also means that I might expect an unwanted surprise in the mail (a.k.a. RQ-lite) and that is not nice. is not nice.

@kisunja85
That's a standard response. In most cases the interview/test proctors are not the same folks who review and make decisions on files. What happens is that your file will be scanned, so to speak, or reviewed before the test if you're lucky and then forwarded onto the test proctor with case notes from your citizenship officer. Since the test is a deciding factor in how the review process is conducted it makes sense that they would get it out of the way and then properly, fully, review the file.

I recommend giving it a month and then requesting your GCMS/electronic file notes to see if there's been any progress.

Edited by canuck25 - 08 Oct 2014 at 12:37pm

dpenabill wrote: Ironmat500 wrote: I am December 2013 applicant. In process: Feb 2014. Got RQ May 2014 and responded with complete documentation on June 2014 to Scarborough as instructed in my RQ letter. Got Test from Scarborough (although my local office should be St. Clair) on Mid August. Got 20/20 on test. Interview was very short and she did check my IDs as well as talking re my job and cross check some dates from my application with my passport. I saw my RQ file there but she never touched it. At the end she said that my RQ is not been reviewed yet and they will send my file to St Clair for someone to review my file. She didn't say why i got test before RQ being reviewed and how long would it take for me to get the oat! 1- Is this a new trend/policy to invite for test before reviewing the RQs? 2- Why am I been invited to send my RQ response as well as doing test & interview at Scarborough while my office should be St Clair and now sending my file to St Clair for someone to review RQ?? Foremost, I am NO expert. Secondly, importantly, things are often in transition, changing, and I am not keeping up with anecdotal reports these days . . . and am not even keeping up with changes in formal sources of information as thoroughly as I was until quite recently. For example, I was not following these matters at all for the ten days previous to today. So, I do not know for sure that RQ submissions are still being reviewed prior to the applicant's appearance at the test and interview. We knew for sure the RQ response was being reviewed so long as the File Requirements Checklist inclusion of the Pre-interview check step remained the same (or mostly the same) as the FRC version in use in 2012. I believe, and strongly so, that there is still at least a very similar Pre-interview check included, with that to include a review of any submissions in response to RQ or other document requests. Distinction: Words are often used imprecisely. The word "review" is, in particular, subject to various meanings. Some mean a formal review resulting in an assessment, a decision-making review. The word is also used in more generic contexts, such as in reference to an examination for the purpose of considering the information submitted. I would be very surprised if an applicant's response to RQ was not, at the very least, examined relative to considering the information, before the test-interview . . . and again, this would be part of the pre-interview check. On the other hand, the CIC person conducting the pre-interview check is not necessarily a Citizenship Officer, so that person's examination, or in a generic sense a "review" of the RQ submission, is not definitive, not a formal assessment. Reminder: the interviewer is not a decision-maker; the interviewer's role is to gather information. (It is not the interviewer's role to advise applicants either.) I cannot say with certainty what specific terms were used with what particular meaning at your interview, but my sense is that when the interviewer said your RQ had not been "reviewed yet" and that "they will send my file to St. Clair for someone to review my file," this was in reference to the more or less formal assessment review, which would be conducted by a Citizenship Officer. In contrast, I would bet a lot that either the interviewer, or someone else, had indeed reviewed (examined) your RQ submission (in a pre-interview check), and that it was considered relative to what deciding what questions you would be asked. As others have reported, the duration and scope of the interview varies from applicant to applicant, and while to some extent this variation arises from how it goes in the questions-and-answers exchange, there is undoubtedly some variation in what questions are planned for particular applicants, based in part on what is in the file, which includes any response to RQ. RE Local office actually doing processing: There have been known patterns in how CIC was distributing files in the GTA, but there are additional changes taking place the last few months which are likely to have an impact on how files are distributed beyond what we know, at least for now. There is no reason to worry much about this. What ultimately matters, of course, is what the facts in your case really are and how well you documented your residency in responding to the RQ. Overall: if you met the residency requirement based on Actual Physical Presence, and documented that in your RQ submission, odds are that all is well and you will be progressing through the process significantly more timely than those RQ'd in the past.