By Mata Press Service

If you think you paid too much in visa fees to come to Canada, you are probably right.

But the Government of Canada feels that even if it did overcharge for the fees, you are not entitled to refunds.

Now, the dispute, which involves over two million people, who entered Canada between October 2009 and March 2015, is wrapped in a rare immigration class action lawsuit, the largest in Canadian legal history.

Last week, Federal Court Justice Sean Harrington approved a motion for the parties to notify eligible litigants to join the legal action.

People coming from visa-required countries, such as China, India and the Philippines, are automatically included in the class action whether they had applied to come to visit, study or work in Canada.

Those not wanting to participate in the legal action have until Nov. 30 to opt out of the proceeding.

In an Agreed Statement of Facts, that was kept secret until last week, the Government has to a large extent admitted its costs to process the visas were much lesser than the $150 it charged each applicant.

Based on the government’s own numbers, the overpayment is estimated to be between $194 million and $240 million.

“Most of the people who are owed money are from China, India, Philippines, and everyone else who needed a visa to come to Canada,” said Richard Kurland, a lawyer for one of the lead plaintiffs.

“This is not tax dollars…a large number paid to come in as students and workers, and are now permanent residents and voting Canadian citizens,” Kurland told Mata Press News Service.

Kurland’s representative plaintiffs are Alan Hinton and Irene Popapova of Coquitlam, B.C.

Hinton, a software technician from Coquitlam, B.C., met his future wife Irena in Moscow

in 2001 and got married the next year. Hinton paid $75, the cost at that time, to get his wife a visitor’s visa to Canada.

Kurland investigated Hinton’s application process and determined, according to court documents that “Hinton, who paid a fee of $75.00 for the determination of an application to sponsor his wife...the costs of the service was $36.69. Given this cost and the fee charges, there is a profit on the service of $38.31."

After Kurland filed a lawsuit using Hinton and his wife as representative claimants in a class action application, the government reduced the current visa processing fees from $150 to $100.

Since then other plaintiffs have joined the case.

Kurland argues that the government of Canada was using the visa fees as a ‘cash cow’ and was making illegal profits.

Under Canada’s Financial Administration Act, the federal government can make money to offset costs of its different services, but it needs Parliament’s permission.

In this case, no such permission was given, he said.

“When you pay $150 fee to process an application and when the application is processed with a visa or a refusal, you’re supposed to be done.

What they were doing was adding in costs for things that happened after you received your decision.”

The government was using the money for issues like port of entry activities associated with processing at a port of entry secondary where no document is issued, responding to media inquiries”, “scanning our environment”, “managing public relations”, processing immigration and citizenship complaints, statistics and research, outreach, promotion and recruitment of immigration officers.

“This is where everything plus the kitchen sink was thrown into the cost,” said Kurland.

"The activities were not required, extraneous to, and separate and distinct from, the processing of multiple entry temporary resident visa applications and single entry temporary resident visa application,” he said.

The Federal Government has acknowledged this in the recently Agreed Statement of Facts but has declined to comment on the case saying it’s before the courts.

Kurland said the government’s position is that "even if it cost less than the fees collected these excess fees are not recoverable.”

“That is the precedent the government is trying to establish…if someone overpays the government for something, the government can keep the money,” he added.

 To find out more about the class action suit, your eligibility to be involved or opt out, go to  http://visalitigation.com/