New extended hours at 10 offices across Canada

Ottawa, August 21, 2019 – There are 10 offices across the country now offering extended hours on Thursday evenings and Saturdays as part of the government’s commitment in Budget 2019.

The following office locations are now offering extended hours:

• Calgary
• Etobicoke
• Halifax
• Mississauga
• Montréal
• Ottawa
• Scarborough
• Vancouver (Expo Office)
• Vancouver (Hornby Office)
• Winnipeg

Select services are available by appointment only during the extended hours. These services include citizenship testing, citizenship ceremonies and the granting of permanent resident status.

Extending office hours allows clients to make appointments outside regular business hours, which saves them time and money, as they are less likely to have to take time off from work. The new extended hours also allow more people to attend citizenship ceremonies, giving new Canadians a better opportunity to celebrate and share this memorable experience with their friends and family.

In the past year, the government has also been working on a number of other service improvements by:

• hiring more than 170 new staff members at Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada’s Client Support Centre and expanding the hours of operation of its call centre
• offering more permanent resident landing services, so new permanent residents can have their final interview with an immigration officer, sign their confirmation of permanent residence and apply for their permanent resident card (PR card)
• streamlining and improving the process for issuing PR cards and delivering them within 7 days to applicants who are applying from within Canada
• exploring new ways to make the citizenship process faster for applicants, for example, Scarborough’s immigration office’s test pilot project, where some clients are immediately scheduled to attend their citizenship ceremony the day after passing their knowledge test