PACP - Client Excellence and Experience in Action - December 5, 2023
Key Facts And Figures
Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) continues to produce a high volume of final decisions across all business lines. Between January and October 2023, IRCC made nearly 6.2M final decisions for permanent residents, temporary residents (excluding Electronic Travel Authorizations) and citizenship. This is a significant increase compared to last year; the Department made 5.2M final decisions across all of 2022.
As of October 31, 2023, 57% of applications in all IRCC inventories are within service standards. Many lines of business are now back within services standards and even offering faster processing times, such as Students and Canadian Experience Class.
IRCC regularly engages with clients on how to improve their service experience, including through annual client experience surveys. Recent surveys show client satisfaction increases when processing times and application status updates are transparent and accurate.
To help clients and their representatives easily track the status of their application information online (without needing to call or email to get the information), IRCC has implemented application status trackers for multiple permanent and temporary residence programs. Clients in citizenship, family class, and Express Entry, as well as Temporary Resident Visa, study permit and work permit lines of business can now self-serve to get this information.
IRCC also modernized its approach to supporting Members of Parliament and Senator offices assisting constituents, for example by:
implementing a new system for Members of Parliament and Senator offices to speak to an agent or officer by appointment at the Ministerial Centre for Members of Parliament and Senators, ensuring reliable and consistent access to IRCC; and,
expanding access to the Application Status Tracker for immigration applications to Members of Parliament and Senator offices.
IRCC’s Client Support Centre is continuing efforts to improve capacity to support clients by email and telephone:
In the 2022-2023 fiscal year, IRCC’s Client Support Centre received 10.6M enquiries, up 128% from the 4.66M received in 2018-2019. This has had significant impact on service levels and performance.
The funding investment from Budget 2022 has allowed IRCC to stabilize resources at the Client Support Centre on a permanent basis, improve tools and technology aimed at ensuring timely client support, and maintain priority operations, such as for the Ministerial Centre for Members of Parliament and Senators and the dedicated crisis lines for Afghanistan and Ukraine.
From January to October 31, 2023, the Client Support Centre responded to 3.86M enquiries by phone and email, including enquiries received by the Ministerial Centre for Members of Parliament and Senators and the dedicated crisis lines for Afghanistan and Ukraine. This was an increase of 537K (16%) compared to the same period in 2022.
The Client Support Centre call answer rate increased to 33% from April to October 2023, compared to 13.5% in 2022-2023.
IRCC is continuing to look for ways to better keep pace with the growing demand for client services, including modernizing tools and increasing client’s options to self-serve.
Key Messages
IRCC is committed to delivering quality client service across its global network as we continue to welcome historic numbers of newcomers. The Department is well positioned to achieve this year’s target of 465,000 admissions for permanent residents.
IRCC has made significant investments in processing. Backlogs are being addressed and cleared, which will ultimately reduce overall processing times, and in turn lead to a reduction in client enquiries. IRCC’s goal is to process 80% of applications within service standards, which allows for expected delays in some very complex cases or when more information is required from clients before finalizing their files.
IRCC continues to improve client services, with strategies informed by client insights gathered through direct client feedback, and to modernize by adapting, modifying, and reinventing how services are delivered to clients.
IRCC is looking to the future to transform the way we work and find better ways to serve our clients more quickly, to communicate with them clearly and often, and to make sure our processes are efficient and easy to use.
Over the next few years, IRCC is undergoing business transformation to modernize the Department’s suite of programs and services to significantly improve the client experience. Under the Digital Platform Modernization Programme, IRCC is working to introduce a new modern online account to provide the tools and capabilities via a single digital ‘front-door’ for a more seamless client experience. Once implemented, it will enable personalized services to clients and replacing outdated and/or standalone client-facing portals and tools.
Supplementary Information
IRCC has hired more employees to increase processing capacity across business lines, reviewed and improved its processes to eliminate steps, and used technologies to support its employees and speed up processing. This has reduced the backlogs of applications within its inventories.
IRCC has continued to accelerate its modernization efforts and deliver timely client service improvements. This includes:
transitioning the majority of Permanent Resident lines of business to 100% digital intake;
implementing the use of automation at the Client Support Centre, ensuring that processing offices receive clients’ documents in a timely manner to support their decision-making processes; and,
introducing online citizenship testing and virtual citizenship ceremonies.
