OINP Employer Job Offer: Foreign Worker Stream

The Employer Job Offer: Foreign Worker stream gives foreign workers with a job offer in a skilled occupation the opportunity to apply to permanently live and work in Ontario.

Your job offer must be in a skilled occupation at Skill Type 0 or Skill Level A or B of the National Occupational Classification (NOC). This stream is open to foreign workers in and outside of Canada.

You must first register in the OINP’s Expression of Interest System and receive an invitation to apply before you can apply online to be nominated by the Ontario government for permanent residence.

If you are nominated, your next step is to apply to the federal government through Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC). They make the final decision on who becomes a permanent resident.

Requirements

Job Offer. – To qualify under the Employer Job Offer: Foreign Worker stream, you must have a job offer in Ontario from an employer that meets the following requirements.

Full Time and Permanent Job offer in NOC Level A, O, and B.

The pay of the job offered must meet or be higher than the median wage level, for that occupation, in the specific region of Ontario where you will be working.

The position offered must be urgently necessary to your employer’s business.

The work you do while in the job offer position must occur primarily in Ontario.

Applicant requrements.

Expression of Interest and Invitation to Apply.

If your job offer is for an occupation that requires a mandatory licence or other authorization in Ontario, you must hold a valid licence or authorization from the appropriate regulatory body in Ontario at the time of application submission.

If your job offer is not for an occupation that requires a mandatory licence or other authorization in Ontario, you must demonstrate work experience in the same occupation as the NOC code of your job offer.

To meet the work experience requirement, you must have at least two years of cumulative paid full-time work experience (or the equivalent in paid part-time work) in the same occupation (same National Occupational Classification code) as your job offer.

You must have gained this work experience within the five years prior to the date you submit your application, not the date you received the invitation to apply. If your work experience was gained in Canada, you must have been legally living and working in Canada.

Cumulative means the work you’ve done must add up to two years – it does not have to be two years of continuous work.

Full-time work experience means working in a job with at least 30 hours of paid work in a week which amounts to at least 3,120 hours of paid work over a two-year period.

Part-time equivalent work experience means:

working in one job for at least 15 hours of paid work in a week amounts to at least 3,120 hours of paid work over a four-year period, working in more than one job for at least 30 hours of paid work in a week, for two years, that amounts to at least 3,120 hours of paid work in that two-year period.

Intention to live in Ontario and if you apply from Canada then legal status in Canada.

General Employer requirements

1. General requirements

To qualify under the Employer Job Offer: Foreign Worker stream, your employer must:

have been in active business for at least three years prior to submitting your application
have business premises in Ontario where you will work
have no outstanding orders made against them under the Ontario Employment Standards Act, 2000 or the Occupational Health and Safety Act
demonstrate that enough effort was made to recruit a Canadian citizen or a permanent resident prior to offering the position to you (this only applies if you are currently living outside Canada or working outside of Ontario)

Employers must demonstrate that reasonable efforts were made to recruit a Canadian citizen or a permanent resident prior to offering the position to the applicant, unless:

the applicant already has a valid work permit to work in Ontario, or
the employer has a positive Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) for the position

The OINP is designed to assist employers in circumstances where their efforts to fill a position domestically were unsuccessful due to skills shortages. Employers are expected to conduct domestic recruitment efforts on their own, or with the assistance of recruitment agencies/specialists (for example, head hunters, human resource consulting firms) who have expertise in recruiting domestic talent.

Please note that the OINP does not consider domestic recruitment efforts carried out by an immigration representative to be reasonable. In such situations, a conflict of interest exists since the immigration representative stands to benefit financially should domestic recruitment efforts be determined to be unsuccessful. If an application indicates that domestic recruitment efforts were undertaken by an immigration representative, the application will be refused.

2. Revenue requirements

Your employer’s business must meet the relevant revenue requirements for the most recently completed fiscal year (the year used for tax or accounting purposes):

a minimum of $1,000,000 in total gross annual revenue if you will work or report to work at a location in the Greater Toronto Area (City of Toronto, Durham, Halton, York and Peel regions) or
a minimum of $500,000 in total gross annual revenue if you will work or report to work at a location outside the Greater Toronto Area

Meaning of report to work

In cases where the applicant will work at more than one location, the location where the applicant will report to work means either:

the location where the applicant’s immediate supervisor or manager works, or
the location of the administrative office where the applicant will receive work assignments

3. Full-time employee requirements

Your employer’s business must have at the time of application submission one of the following:

at least five full-time employees who are Canadian citizens or permanent residents who work at the location where you will work, or will report to work, if you will work or report to work at a location in the Greater Toronto Area (City of Toronto, Durham, Halton, York and Peel regions)
at least three full-time employees who are Canadian citizens or permanent residents who work at the location where you will work, or will report to work, if you will work or report to work at a location outside the Greater Toronto Area

Meaning of full-time employee

A full-time employee is an employee who has worked a minimum of 30 hours per week.

4. Employer Form

Your employer must make an application for approval of an employment position by filling out and signing an Employer Form.

Your employer then must give you the form so you can scan and upload it with your application.

Scoring factors

Once you register an expression of interest under this stream you will be assigned points based on the following factors.

If you are invited to apply, you will be required to submit specific documents to support each scoring factor for which you received points. Scoring factors are not the same as stream criteria. You must meet all criteria for this stream and provide the mandatory documents with your application. Refer to the document checklist for the Employer Job Offer: Foreign Worker stream.