IRCC proposes the creation of the Compensation Fund for Victims of Immigration Consultants

Immigration, refugees and citizenship of Canada (IRCC) have proposed new regulations that could provide millions of dollars in compensation for victims of dishonest immigration consultants.

This change is part of a series of draft regulations for a series of changes in governance and operations of the Faculty of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants, published in La Gaceta.

The school is the regulatory authority established by IRCC in 2021 to supervise immigration and citizenship consultants and protect the public.

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Compensation Fund

The proposed regulations would establish when immigration consultants are eligible to receive compensation for suffering the dishonest law of a registered consultant.

In an analysis of how the Compensation Fund could operate, IRCC projects that in period 1, the fund would issue 146 payments, with an average estimated payment of $ 4,652. In the first 10 periods, the Ministry estimates that the compensation fund payments would total $ 5,756,304.

The regulations would also be established when customers would need to request compensation and when they could receive without applying compensation.

According to current regulations, if the College Discipline Committee determined that a client suffered a financial loss as a result of the dishonest law of a licensee, the client would be informed of his eligibility for the university compensation, without required the application.

Regulations indicate that compensation requests would be required in cases where

• The University Discipline Committee has determined that the licensee committed a dishonest act, but could not determine the financial loss; either
• The Complaints Committee did not send the client’s complaint to the Discipline Committee, because the license of the licensee has been revoked.

The proposed regulations would also establish how the Compensation Fund will be managed and financed.

The objective of the new regulations is to encourage representatives paid to act more honest and to combat fraud. Regulations are expected to enter into force in 2025.

Additional changes

The regulations also aim to extend the authority of the university when it comes to the following:

• The Public Registry of Immigration Consultants: This can help the university verifying instantly if a consultant is authorized to provide immigration services.
• Complaints and discipline processes: This can optimize processes.
• Research: This would grant the university more authority to conduct research in suspicious fraud consultants.

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The draft of the regulations is based on the Pagured immigration representatives that violate the lawwhich were announced earlier this year by Mar Miller, immigration minister.

At a press conference on January 15, 2025, Miller announced the intention of IRCC to implement toughest fines along with a name and shame campaign.

Huge financial sanctions

The proposed sanctions include fines of up to $ 1.5 million to advise customers to misrepresent themselves.

Note: Misrepresentation It refers to providing information to the Canadian government that is not true and that may cause an error when applying the immigration law to the case.

The misrepresentation can lead to serious consequences for applicants, including rejected requests, fines, which are prohibited from requesting Canadian immigration for five years; and/or receive the order to leave Canada.

Public dissemination of criminals

Information about paid representatives declared guilty of violations on the website of the department will be published.

This would include publishing the nature of the violation, the amount of the fine and an indication of whether the representative has paid the fine.

What do immigration consultants and immigration representatives do?

Immigration consultants guide people and families on the navigation of the Canadian immigration system. Citizenship or immigration consultants must be members of the Faculty of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants.

Immigration representatives Offer immigration advice and help people choose the best immigration programs for their objectives. They can also act in the name of an applicant for immigration and citizenship requests, while communicating with the government or at the hearings.

There are two types of representatives: paid and not paid.

The representatives paid must be authorized by the Government. These include

• Lawyers and legal assistants who are members with a good reputation of a Canadian provincial or territorial law society;
• Notaries who are members in good position of the Chambre DES Nottaraires du Québec; and
• Citizenship or Immigration consultants who are members in good position of the Faculty of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants.

Anyone can act as an unpaid representative. However, it must be declared in a request if there was the use of a representative, paid or unpaid. Do not reveal that this can lead to an application being rejected.

Note: If you provide any form of compensation to a representative in exchange for their services, they are considered paid and must be authorized.

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