 Hi everybody and welcome to our channel. Today we wanted to make a video on the coronavirus situation and talk a little bit about how this could potentially impact immigration and our clients. I'm here with my executive assistant Jolie, so she's joining us today so she can discuss with us a little bit later on in the video how our office functions and how we're going to be continuing to work on files for our clients. So the first thing I want to talk about is how immigration is canceling major events in terms of when a lot of people are together. So for example all citizenship ceremonies, landing appointments, interviews, so these are posted on the immigration website. We've also received some emails for some of our clients who had for example a citizenship interview scheduled next week that has been a citizenship old ceremony that has been rescheduled, well not rescheduled but canceled essentially. So of course these are very disappointing and it's scary because you know you're like well I was gonna become a citizen and now I'm not, but in those cases it's not that bad because you know you've already gone through all the processes and there's just like an administrative step in order to overcome that and I know by reading because in our legal community we have access to a group of lawyers from the Ontario Bar Association, there's an immigration section where all the immigration lawyers can talk to each other and share information and it's amazing to have this group as lawyers because we get sometimes information first and we can share it with our clients and the public and I read that some appointments might be done over the phone for landing for example or some interviews. I think if this pandemic situation goes on for a long time I think these measures will be put in place especially nowadays with the technologies that we have I think it might create a new way of working and and doing things. I don't know if you'll be able to become a citizen by doing it over the phone or by Skype but perhaps that's that's the future I'm not sure of that. One thing that I wanted to mention is that already we have some of our clients that have messaged us and emailed us like what's gonna happen with my file what's gonna happen if I'm applying for a visa I've heard that Canada is not issuing any visas right now offices are closing what's important to know is that it's very important to look at the immigration and citizenship website or if you have dealings with Canada border service agency to look at that website to look at official government website about health and you know transport customs travel because there's a lot of blogs out there a lot of website a lot of fake news a lot of people will write certain things there's one website that's going around saying that no visa is being issued or even like Canadians cannot even come to Canada and things like that so you know I think in this situation a lot of people have panicked in some situations understandably it's scary especially in North America we've never really experienced something like this but my recommendation is to look at the official websites and wait for information and listen to what the authorities are are saying it about traveling and borders so for example we had one client ask us well I have to apply for my family members applying for visa but how am I gonna get the how are the documents gonna come to Canada so for example there's a lot of applications that we can do online for example a visitor visa a super visa and an extension application our office does them all online and we actually don't even need physical documents we just need scanned copies I have not yet heard of courier companies like FedEx FedEx Canada posts and things like that like halt operations so if we do need original documents I think the mail is still okay and hopefully you know that will keep working and we could get documentation now I know in a lot of situations for example you know people we have deadlines for example for files and clients have to get biometrics or photos or medical examinations police certificates right and they can't you know if they're in a country where there's a curfew or they can't get out well they can't get any of those documentation is done and there's deadlines but what the information that we receive from immigration is that they're going to apply additional time so I don't think anybody is gonna be negatively affected by this because they couldn't meet the timeline because of circumstances outside of their control so I'm really not worried about that what we're telling our clients is if you if you're confused if you you're wondering what's gonna happen there's a deadline you have to do a biometric and you're not sure just call us call us first you can go on the website on the government website but better call us first because sometimes we have other information from our legal community that's maybe not online that's gonna be more beneficial for you so instead of talking to other people talking to friends looking online and getting scared and panic call us and we'll guide you the right way and if we don't know the answer we'll look into it we'll research and we'll let you know there are talks today for example I think the prime minister announced that they're closing the borders for not for Canadians and permanent resident and certain flight you know diplomats and crews but they're trying to mitigate the the situation and there's exceptional circumstances where you wouldn't be able to travel to Canada now that is that is a big deal I think for a lot of people it's gonna be a big deal for a lot of clients but we don't know how long this is gonna last so it's important to take things day by day at the office we try our best to keep up with the news as you know in real time so if you're wondering what's gonna happen with your flight you let us know if there's something we can do to contact immigration on your behalf we'll do it if there's except exceptional circumstances we'll try our best last thing is about about this is information changes very fast so you know Monday March 16 today I think it was on Friday that the government announced that kind of state of emergency only go out if you have to and all you know public places have been closed your school has been closed for how long for roughly two weeks and then going online two weeks following that so close for indefinite so yeah exactly so you know things change a lot so we have to sometimes especially that this is very new I mean maybe next week things will be completely different maybe next month things will get back to normal you know I heard that things will get worse before they get better but maybe it won't take that long and you know we have to trust our government we have to trust that our leaders are gonna put things in place and you know the idea is that we everybody tries our we try our best to do social distancing so that we don't affect the most vulnerable people so for example in our office we're taking some measures so I'm gonna let Jolie talk a little bit about what measures we decided to take today we are still fully operational so you can tell us a little bit what we've kind of started to do yeah so I mean I think it's great that our office already has these effective measures and effective policies in place that where we don't actually need to be in the office to work so our office is largely paperless and that has over the time been very advantageous to us especially now so we don't actually have clients coming in for consultations anymore they're not coming into delivered documents but again as Mary says businesses as usual we're still working tirelessly to finalize these applications and if anything we're reachable by phone by email and many of our clients send in documents by email anyways so we're doing our part to try and limit the amount of social contact that we have with our clients while still maintaining our usual office flow so I think that's really important for people who are looking either to hire us or current clients that we already have that we're still you know we're still low working on their applications in a timely manner exactly so we had a staff meeting today and we decided that you know some of most of our staff would like to work from home so you know it's not complicated for us we bring the computers at home we transfer lines printers and because we're paperless because we have everything on a very safe and secure cloud-based system we're very organized in this office and we're very proud of that so I think in a certain in a situation like this it allows us to use those tools even more so like Julie said like where you know we we we talk on the phone we do Skype we fax we get faxes we email we Google chat between each other our staff has a WhatsApp group that we communicate if need be so with today's technologies I mean we've been doing this for a very long time and I think in a situation like this it's it's perfect for our current clients like I said if you have any questions about your file or the future you contact us and we'll give you information as we we we go if for some reason this is one thing that I want to talk about I don't know if immigration is actually going to shut down their offices I I know there's a lot of different immigration offices in Canada obviously there's all the embassies in the high consulates and outside Canada but in Canada there's you know in Sydney and Edmonton Vancouver Ottawa Montreal a lot of offices I don't know how big those spaces are I don't know how many people work in those offices I don't know if goes government employees work from home if they have online systems so I I'm not sure if that's the more they're gonna say we cannot file up those file applications anymore because if no one's working and we're just sending application and they're piling up in a mailroom I don't know if immigration is okay with that but then in some cases we need to lock in applications for example if a dependent child is going to turn 2022 so what's going on with that so we'll find out as we get along I think it's important to give some time to these agencies to you know figure out you know there's urgent situations like borders and you know cancelling festivals and big events but for example the IRB immigration refugee board CBSA they have shut down a lot of their non-urgent services and they've also delayed all hearings but in terms of IRC actually processing like can we file things online can we submit an espousal sponsorship they haven't really given notice about that I think what they've talked about is delays potential delays on certain applications especially for example landing appointments and things like that but if for some reason we can't file an application but you know you've hired us well what we're implementing is that well we work on your file this is a good opportunity to have more time to perfect your application we put on hold and then when things reopen which I'm sure they will then we reopen we reassess we update the forms if need be and we take it from there if there's a lot of delays on your file I mean delays of immigration we're used to that right so there might be now more delays I don't know how long but there's just just something you know expected in these kind of situations and like I said I you know if we get information that immigration is not accepting applications then we have a newsletter we have a Facebook page we advise clients when we do consultations now we're very upfront and honest we say look okay you want to do espousal sponsorship but just so you know this is the current situation so if things happen we might put your file on hold it's not going to jeopardize your your your file with us we're not going to charge additional legal fees we're gonna put it aside if for some reason when we really open there's a new situation maybe reassess in terms of legal fees but it's something that we've done before a lot especially when there was parental sponsorship caps we couldn't follow the application because the cap was met so we would put the file on hold and reopen the the following year so yeah I think that's that's everything like I said a staff can work from home if need be we have means to communicate with each other FedEx courier we're asking our clients to send the application to us even our Montreal we have clients in my we're in Montreal and we have an office in Toronto our processing office is mainly in Montreal we're asking even our clients in Montreal to not come to the office but FedEx the documentation to us we have a lot of clients in all provinces we have clients outside Canada so scanning documentation is not an issue FedEx sync documentation is not an issue we actually have a lot of clients that we've never met I if you know a lot of times we do Skype consultations but sometimes I've many times I've talked to clients from beginning to end over the phone or by email and I actually only see what they look like if I get a photo so that's something that we're very familiar with and I like I said with today's technology it's good for for our law firm that we can still continue helping people we're gonna send out a newsletter soon with all of this information we're gonna like I said we have a Facebook page and we every month we send out a newsletter and if you're thinking of finding an application you have an inquiry you can contact us we schedule phone or Skype consultations for the time being we give a lot of information by email and my advice is to not panic take a day by day I know it's hard for a lot of businesses a lot of people especially you know I just think in our world in the world that we we work in you know I'm thinking about elderly people that had to travel to Canada or people that had to you know come and help with like a newborn you know immigration visas this affects like real people it's real problems but it's important to take a day by day as things unfold and to call us if you have a question contact us is there anything you wanted to add I think I mean also in light of the recent events one to not panic but to to also refer to reliable sources of information so stay away from Facebook stay away from blogs fear mongering all this it's really important to go to government websites World Health Organization in terms of immigration IRCC and the IRB websites are really useful and they provide news daily updating the situation so I think if you're in one of these vulnerable situations to refer to these sources and from there you'll get credible information exactly and as lawyers law firms we get a lot of information from our Bar Association so I'm a member of the Quebec Bar I'm a member of the Law Society in Ontario member of the Ontario Bar Association and we've been amazing at providing information about how to you know what are you gonna do with your law firm how you're gonna deal with your clients what source to look at so if you have a lawyer talk to your lawyer if you're really confused about something get on a call with a lawyer send an email get some information to get the the right information so thank you and thank you Jolie for participating and we'll see you in our next video and hopefully next time things will be a little bit better out there in the world