If you’re out of status in Canada, you have several viable legal options to restore your status or secure permanent residence, including:
Being out of status doesn’t mean your immigration journey is over. We specialize in Federal Court litigation and urgent immigration matters, positioning us to handle challenging cases that other firms may find difficult to resolve.
If you’re facing an out-of-status situation, contact our deportation lawyer in Canada for immediate guidance on protecting your legal position.
When you find yourself without legal status in Canada, immediate action becomes essential to protect your future. Our Toronto-based immigration law firm specializes in complex cases and Federal Court litigation, positioning us uniquely to handle out-of-status situations that require sophisticated legal strategies.
We recognize that losing status often involves government processing delays, administrative errors, or circumstances beyond your control.
Our approach focuses on identifying the strongest legal pathway for your specific situation. Whether you need status restoration within the 90-day window, require a Temporary Resident Permit for compelling circumstances, or qualify for permanent residence through humanitarian grounds or spousal sponsorship, we develop strategies tailored to your unique circumstances and family situation.
With over 20 years of experience in Canadian immigration law, we have successfully represented clients facing:
Out of status means your temporary resident status has expired, and you no longer have legal authorization to remain in Canada. This occurs when a visitor, student, or work permits expire without renewal, or when you violate the conditions of your permit. The Immigration and Refugee Protection Act requires temporary residents to maintain a valid status throughout their stay.
Status loss can happen through various circumstances. Sometimes clients miss renewal deadlines due to postal delays, illness, or family emergencies. Other situations involve government processing errors, where IRCC fails to process applications before permit expiry despite timely submission.
We’ve also seen cases where clients receive incorrect advice from unregulated consultants, leading to status violations.
The consequences of being out of status extend beyond immigration concerns. You lose work authorization immediately, cannot access healthcare in most provinces, and face potential removal proceedings. Children can still attend public school under provincial education laws, but families often avoid enrollment due to fear of detection.
We help you navigate these complex situations by assessing your specific circumstances and developing strategic approaches that protect your immediate legal position while working toward long-term solutions.
Status restoration allows you to regain legal status within 90 days of expiry, provided you met all permit conditions before losing status. This pathway applies to most temporary residents who lost status through oversight rather than violations. IRCC charges a restoration fee of $200 plus processing fees for new permits, according to the current IRCC fee schedules.
The restoration process requires demonstrating that you maintained legal status requirements before expiry. For work permit holders, this means showing you worked only for authorized employers and respected permit conditions. Students must prove they maintained full-time enrollment and academic standing. Visitors need evidence that they respected their authorized stay duration and didn’t work illegally.
You can also restore status in a different category during this 90-day period. A work permit holder who lost employment might be restored as a student if accepted to a Canadian institution. However, you must meet all requirements for the new permit category and provide comprehensive documentation supporting your application.
The 90-day deadline remains absolute with no extensions possible. Applications submitted after this window face automatic refusal, making timing crucial. We recommend applying within 60 days to account for potential documentation delays or processing issues.
We guide you through the restoration process by ensuring your application meets all requirements and deadlines while maximizing your chances of approval.
Time is critical for status restoration applications. Schedule a consultation to ensure your application meets all requirements and deadlines.
When the 90-day restoration window expires, Temporary Resident Permits (TRPs) may provide authorization to remain in Canada despite lacking status. TRPs require demonstrating compelling reasons justifying your stay and that the benefits to Canada outweigh any risk you might pose. Processing occurs at IRCC’s discretion, making strong legal arguments essential for approval.
Compelling circumstances include family separation hardships, particularly involving Canadian children who would face educational disruption or emotional trauma from your removal. Well-founded fears of persecution or violence in your home country also support TRP applications.
Employment situations benefiting Canada, such as essential work during labour shortages or unique specialized skills, may justify temporary authorization.
TRPs are issued for specific durations up to three years, with renewal possible for ongoing compelling circumstances. After maintaining TRP status for sufficient periods, you may become eligible for permanent residence applications. However, TRPs don’t guarantee future immigration success and require continuous justification for renewal.
The application process requires comprehensive documentation proving compelling circumstances and community ties. We prepare detailed legal submissions addressing IRCC’s assessment criteria while anticipating potential concerns about your previous status violations.
We prepare comprehensive TRP applications that effectively present your compelling circumstances while addressing IRCC’s assessment criteria and anticipating potential concerns about your previous status violations.
💡 Additional reading: temporary resident permit (TRP)
Humanitarian and Compassionate (H&C) applications provide permanent residence pathways for out-of-status individuals facing exceptional hardship if required to leave Canada.
These applications allow IRCC officers to grant permanent residence despite not meeting standard immigration program requirements. Success requires demonstrating that refusal would cause unusual, undeserved, or disproportionate hardship.
H&C assessments consider establishment in Canada, including employment history, community involvement, and social integration. The best interests of affected children receive significant weight, particularly Canadian-born children who might face educational disruption, language barriers, or reduced opportunities abroad.
Adverse country conditions, including political instability, economic hardship, or inadequate healthcare access, also influence decisions.
Processing times typically range from 18 to 36 months, during which you cannot leave Canada without abandoning your application. This creates challenges for family emergencies abroad but provides certainty about remaining in Canada during processing.
Approval grants permanent residence for you and your included family members, while refusal typically leads to removal proceedings.
Our Federal Court litigation experience proves valuable when H&C applications receive unreasonable refusals. We’ve successfully challenged decisions where officers failed to consider crucial evidence about children’s best interests or dismissed documented country condition evidence without proper analysis.
We develop comprehensive H&C strategies that address all assessment factors while building the strongest possible case for your establishment in Canada and potential hardship factors.
💡 Additional reading: Canada deportation
H&C applications require comprehensive legal strategies addressing all assessment factors. Contact us to discuss your establishment in Canada and potential hardship factors.
Canadian citizens and permanent residents can sponsor out-of-status spouses or common-law partners through in-Canada applications, which waive normal temporary status requirements.
This special policy recognizes family unity principles while allowing couples to remain together during processing. However, being out of status remains the only Immigration Act breach that doesn’t automatically disqualify sponsorship eligibility.
In-Canada sponsorship applications require proving relationship genuineness through extensive documentation spanning your relationship timeline. IRCC examines communication records, joint financial arrangements, shared residence evidence, and social integration as a couple. Applications also require medical examinations and background checks for sponsored persons.
Processing advantages include maintaining first-stage approval protection against removal proceedings and potential work authorization for sponsored persons. However, in-Canada applications forfeit appeal rights if refused, unlike overseas applications that allow Immigration Appeal Division reviews.
Processing times typically range from 12 to 20 months, during which sponsored persons cannot leave Canada without abandoning their applications.
The relationship must be genuine when the application begins and continue throughout processing. Marriage breakdown during processing typically leads to application abandonment. Common-law relationships require proving cohabitation for at least one year before application submission.
We guide couples through the complex documentation requirements and help you present the strongest possible evidence of your relationship’s genuineness while navigating the strategic considerations unique to in-Canada applications.
Being out of status becomes complicated when combined with criminal inadmissibility, medical issues, or misrepresentation concerns. Multiple inadmissibilities require comprehensive legal strategies addressing each ground separately while demonstrating rehabilitation or mitigation measures.
Our experience with complex Federal Court litigation proves essential for these challenging cases.
Criminal inadmissibility affects many out-of-status individuals, particularly those with DUI convictions or assault charges. Deemed rehabilitation applies to single offences after 10 years have elapsed since completion of sentences, but serious criminality requires individual rehabilitation applications regardless of time passed.
Medical inadmissibility involves conditions requiring treatment costs exceeding current thresholds or posing public health risks.
Misrepresentation inadmissibility carries a five-year bar from Canada, but humanitarian circumstances may overcome these barriers through H&C applications. Previous deportation creates additional complexity requiring Authorized Return to Canada permits before new applications.
Each inadmissibility ground requires specific documentation and legal arguments for successful resolution.
We’ve represented clients facing multiple inadmissibility grounds while out of status, developing strategies that address all legal barriers simultaneously. Our Federal Court experience includes successful challenges to medical inadmissibility decisions and misrepresentation findings based on procedural fairness violations.
We develop strategies that address all legal barriers simultaneously, drawing on our Federal Court experience with successful challenges to medical inadmissibility decisions and misrepresentation findings based on procedural fairness violations.
Government processing errors often contribute to status loss, creating grounds for Federal Court challenges when procedural fairness violations occur. Officers sometimes fail to provide adequate opportunity to respond to concerns, ignore relevant evidence, or apply incorrect legal tests in their decision-making. Our Federal Court litigation experience positions us to identify and challenge these violations effectively.
Procedural fairness requires officers to provide clear reasons for refusal, consider all relevant evidence, and allow meaningful response opportunities to negative credibility findings. Violations include failing to disclose officer concerns before final decisions, ignoring relevant supporting documentation, or applying incorrect legal standards to evidence assessment.
Recent Federal Court decisions emphasize officers’ obligations to consider children’s best interests in H&C applications and refugee claims. Courts have overturned decisions where officers provided inadequate analysis of establishment factors or dismissed country condition evidence without proper justification.
Our litigation success includes cases where officers failed to consider compelling evidence of family hardship, ignored medical documentation supporting humanitarian claims, or violated natural justice principles in their decision-making processes. Federal Court success typically results in applications being returned to IRCC for redetermination by different officers.
Our litigation success has resulted in applications being returned to IRCC for redetermination by different officers when government processing errors contributed to unfair outcomes.
If government processing errors contributed to your status loss, book a consultation to assess potential challenges to protect your rights.
Losing status immediately terminates work authorization, regardless of employment contracts or employer needs. Continuing to work without authorization violates Immigration Act provisions and can complicate future applications due to misrepresentation concerns. Employers also face penalties for hiring workers without valid authorization, creating mutual legal risks.
Some restoration applications may include interim work authorization requests, but approval remains discretionary and uncommon. TRP applications can include work authorization components when employment supports compelling circumstance arguments. H&C applicants may receive work permits after first-stage approval, typically 12 to 18 months into processing.
Unauthorized work history requires careful disclosure in future applications to avoid misrepresentation findings. Officers assess unauthorized work periods when evaluating an establishment in Canada, sometimes viewing employment positively despite technical violations. However, exploitation situations or substandard working conditions may support humanitarian arguments about hardships faced while out of status.
Professional licensing bodies may also suspend credentials for individuals lacking work authorization, affecting healthcare providers, engineers, and other regulated professionals. Restoration of status becomes crucial for maintaining professional standings and career continuity.
We advise clients on how to maintain professional standings while navigating status restoration and help you present unauthorized work history in ways that support rather than undermine your immigration applications.
Canadian-born children of out-of-status parents face unique challenges when families consider voluntary departure or face removal proceedings. These children hold Canadian citizenship but may experience educational disruption, language barriers, and reduced opportunities if relocated to their parents’ countries of origin.
Courts increasingly recognize these impacts in humanitarian assessments.
Educational disruption affects Canadian children who must adapt to different curricula, languages, and cultural expectations abroad. Research from the Dr. Eric Jackman Institute of Child Study at the University of Toronto demonstrates that educational transitions create academic and emotional challenges for children, particularly when moving to countries with limited educational resources or different pedagogical approaches.
Healthcare access also concerns Canadian children relocating to countries with inadequate medical systems. Children with ongoing medical conditions, learning disabilities, or mental health needs may face treatment interruptions or inferior care standards. These factors receive significant weight in H&C assessments and TRP applications.
Social integration represents another crucial factor. Canadian children develop friendships, cultural connections, and community ties that removal would sever. Extended family relationships in Canada also support children’s emotional stability and cultural identity development.
We help you document these factors comprehensively to strengthen your applications while ensuring children’s best interests receive proper consideration in all proceedings.
Provincial differences affect out-of-status individuals differently across Canada’s regions. Healthcare coverage varies significantly, with some provinces providing emergency services regardless of status, while others require payment for all medical care. Educational access remains consistent through provincial education acts, but enrollment practices differ between school boards.
Employment markets also influence H&C assessments and TRP applications. Regions experiencing labour shortages may view unauthorized workers more favourably, particularly in healthcare, agriculture, or skilled trades. Economic integration evidence carries more weight in areas where immigrants contribute to critical workforce needs.
Settlement services availability affects successful integration arguments. Urban centres like Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal offer extensive community support networks, language training, and cultural organizations that strengthen establishment claims. Rural communities may provide different integration evidence through local employment and community involvement.
Legal representation access varies significantly across regions. Major centres have numerous immigration lawyers, while remote areas may require clients to travel extensively for legal services or rely on telephone consultations. This geographic factor doesn’t affect legal rights but can impact application quality and timing.
We serve clients across Canada from our Toronto base, adapting our strategies to account for regional variations that may affect your specific situation and application prospects.
Our Toronto-based practice serves clients across Canada, providing specialized immigration law services regardless of your location. Contact us to discuss your regional considerations.
Timing becomes critical when multiple pathways exist for resolving out-of-status situations. The 90-day restoration window remains absolute, but other applications allow more flexible timing based on strategic considerations. Processing times help inform financial and emotional planning for extended uncertainty periods.
H&C applications typically require 24 to 36 months for processing, with additional time for Federal Court challenges if necessary. The in-Canada sponsorship application process takes 12 to 20 months, while TRP applications may take 6 to 18 months, depending on complexity. These timelines affect employment authorization, travel possibilities, and family planning decisions.
Sequential application strategies sometimes prove necessary. Clients might pursue TRPs for immediate protection while preparing comprehensive H&C applications for long-term solutions. Spousal sponsorship may follow successful H&C approvals when relationships develop after initial applications. Each pathway requires careful timing to maximize success prospects.
Emergencies require immediate legal intervention. Removal proceedings, detention scenarios, or deportation orders demand urgent responses to protect clients’ rights. Our experience with urgent immigration matters positions us to respond quickly when time-sensitive situations develop.
We respond quickly to time-sensitive situations, drawing on our experience with urgent immigration matters to protect your legal position while developing comprehensive long-term strategies.
Navigating out-of-status situations requires experienced legal guidance that encompasses both immigration law complexities and the human impacts of status loss. We recognize that losing status creates fear, uncertainty, and practical challenges for you and your family.
Our role extends beyond application preparation to providing strategic counsel that addresses your complete immigration picture.
Our Federal Court litigation experience distinguishes us from general immigration practices. When government decisions lack procedural fairness or ignore crucial evidence, we possess the specialized skills to challenge these determinations effectively. This capability proves essential for complex out-of-status cases involving multiple inadmissibility grounds or systematic government errors.
We understand that each out-of-status situation involves unique circumstances requiring personalized legal strategies. Rather than applying standard solutions, we assess your establishment in Canada, family relationships, country conditions, and potential hardship factors to develop comprehensive approaches that maximize your success prospects while protecting your immediate legal position.
We assess your establishment in Canada, family relationships, country conditions, and potential hardship factors to develop comprehensive approaches that maximize your success prospects while protecting your immediate legal position. Rather than applying standard solutions, we create personalized legal strategies that reflect your unique circumstances and immigration goals.
Don’t face your out-of-status situation alone. Call us at 416.988.8853 or schedule a consultation to discuss your legal options and develop a strategic plan for securing your future in Canada.
You have exactly 90 days from your permit expiry date to apply for status restoration in Canada. This deadline is absolute with no extensions possible, regardless of circumstances like illness or postal delays. Applications submitted after the 90-day window face automatic refusal, making immediate action essential when you discover your status has expired.
Working without authorization while out of status creates additional immigration violations that can severely complicate future applications. CBSA may issue removal orders for both status violations and unauthorized work, potentially leading to bars from returning to Canada. All future immigration applications must disclose this history, requiring careful legal strategies to address multiple inadmissibility grounds simultaneously.
Leaving Canada automatically abandons your in-Canada spousal sponsorship application, with no exceptions for family emergencies or business travel. Unlike overseas sponsorship applications, in-Canada applicants must remain physically present throughout the entire 12-20 month processing period. This restriction requires careful planning for any urgent travel needs that may arise during processing.
Immigration lawyer fees for out-of-status cases vary significantly based on complexity, with restoration applications typically costing less than Federal Court litigation or comprehensive H&C applications. Most Toronto immigration lawyers charge between $200-500 per hour or flat fees for specific services. Complex cases involving multiple inadmissibility grounds or urgent proceedings may require substantial legal investment but often prove essential for successful outcomes.
CBSA’s limited enforcement resources mean many out-of-status individuals go undetected for extended periods, particularly if they avoid interactions with government authorities. However, detection risk increases through routine activities like airport travel, police contact, or application attempts. Discovery typically results in removal orders, making proactive legal solutions preferable to hoping enforcement doesn’t occur.
