Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultants (RCICs) are experts of Canadian immigration laws, regulations, and procedures. Working with an RCIC can greatly facilitate your immigration process to Canada. However, it is imperative that you check that your consultant is regulated and in good standing with ICCRC. Otherwise, they are not allowed to charge a fee to assist you in your immigration process.

A number of fraudulent individuals have been reaching out to prospective immigrants pretending to be RCICs. They portray immigrating to Canada as an easy process with little to no requirements if you hire the right people. That is simply not true. I am aware of at least five people who have been approached by fake consultants that were using my name and my picture on WhattsApp to provide fake advise, putting individuals and families in jeopardy. I would recommend to ONLY communicate with consultants using the contact information listed on the ICCRC website and avoid using social media and WhattsApp as it is easy to steal someone's identity. 

If someone contacts you pretending to be me, please let me know and contacts ICCRC as soon as possible. You should contacts ICCRC any time you are contacted by a Canadian immigration consultant that is not licensed. 

As you work on your "Canadian Dream", you must ensure you are working with top experts that are regulated and legally allowed to assist you. The risk of fraud is high and many individuals are out there trying to take advantage of immigrants. MAKE SURE you only use the email address listed on ICCRC to deal with your consultant. DO NOT engage with strangers on WhattsAPP or other social media that are saying they can help you immigrate to Canada. They may try to steal your money. 

Like many other consultants, other people try to impersonate me on a regular basis. Here are few examples from the many I have been sending to the authorities over the past few months.

LinkedIn recently produced a list of the most sought after employers in Canada by looking at four key metrics: interest in the company, engagement with employees, job demand and employee retention. These employers are not necessarily Canada's best employers, but they are employers that generate the most interest from Canadian job seekers. 

Here is the top 10:

1. Royal Bank of Canada
2. Toronto Dominion
3. Scotiabank
4. Canadian International Bank of Commerce (CIBC)
5. Bank of Montreal Financial Group (BMO)
6. Deloitte Canada
7. National Bank of Canada
8. Shopify
9. Desjardins
10. PwC Canada

There are many factors to consider when deciding whether to relocate to Canada or not. Immigrating to a new country is a big commitment and it required a significant monetary investment from purchasing flights, buying new furniture, paying the legal fees, possibly retaining a Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultant, etc. 

Most prospective immigrants are curious to know how much they can expect to earn once in Canada. Although it is impossible to know for sure, there is some data that can be useful in making predictions. 

In Canada, each province or territory has a legal minimum wage. That is the hourly wage under which it is illegal for employers to pay you. This means that you can count on being paid at least the following wages for any job in Canada. 

It can also be useful to look at the annual average salaries for each province. As a whole, the average salary in Canada is around $51,000 and the GDP per capita is USD $48,300, which is essentially the amount of money generated in Canada divided by the number of inhabitants. Canada currently ranks in the world's top 35, well before many other developed countries such as Belgium, United Kingdom, Japan, France, Finland, the European Union as a whole, South Korea, Italy, Spain, Portugal, New Zealand, and many more.

Canadians are generally heavily taxed in order to fund world-class universally available services such as health care and education. On average, Canadians spend more on taxes than they do on basic necessities such as housing. In fact, a typical Canadian family will pay 42.5% of their income to the government. This may be something you are not used to and that you must account for when budgeting. Unlike many other countries, Canada does not include the sales tax to prices displayed in stores. As such, shoppers have to add between 5% and 15% to the cost of most items they purchase, depending on where they live. You can estimate your after-tax income online. It's impossible to truly know how much one individual will pay in taxes without more information. There are a long list of tax deductible expenses and tax credits available to help you reduce the amount of tax you will owe at the end of the year. Fortunately, most employers will automatically take money off your pay-check so you only need to make minor adjustments at the end of the year to either pay a little more or claim a refund if you overpaid. 

The cost of living in Canada is very reasonable. Only one Canadian city made it to the top 30 of the world's most expensive city and only another city made the top 100. 

In Canada, professional occupations are attribued NOCs (National Occupational Classification). Once you know what your NOC is, you can look at job prospects and salary expectations by towns, cities, regions, and provinces.