By Mata Press Service

Amanpreet Singh thought he had finally found his way to Canada.

The 29-year-old mechanical technician from Punjab had seen a WhatsApp ad from a company promising a guaranteed Alberta job, an approved work permit and a fast track to permanent residency.

The pitch looked professional. There was a retainer agreement, a job offer on Edmonton company letterhead and what appeared to be an immigration pre-approval notice.

His family spent their savings and borrowed from relatives to wire nearly $30,000 to a man claiming to be a regulated Canadian immigration consultant.

When Amanpreet arrived in Edmonton on a visitor visa, the job did not exist. The warehouse address on his paperwork led nowhere. The employer had never heard of him. A licensed lawyer later told him no work permit application had been filed, the labour-market number on his documents belonged to another case and the consultant had cloned the licence number and logo of a real regulated adviser.

Amanpreet’s case reflects the kind of fraud, forged paperwork and false promises that have cast a shadow on Canada’s immigration system for years, leaving would-be newcomers out of pocket, out of status and sometimes exposed to allegations of misrepresentation for relying on documents they did not know were fake.

Since the College of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants was created in 2021 to police the profession, action has been taken in scores of cases against licensed consultants. Parliamentary briefing material shows the College’s Discipline Committee had taken at least 77 disciplinary actions by late 2023, including fines, practice restrictions, suspensions and permanent revocations. More tribunal decisions and enforcement bulletins followed through 2024 and 2025.

The College’s 2025 annual reporting shows 11,994 regulated Canadian immigration consultants were in good standing as of June 2025. Of those, 11,733 were based in Canada and 261 were located internationally. That official overseas number is small compared with the much broader world of foreign-based education agents, recruiters and advisers who market Canada as a pathway to work, study and permanent residence, often beyond the reach of Canadian regulators.

Immigration Minister Lena Metlege Diab recently announced new federal regulations to strengthen oversight of immigration and citizenship consultants, improve public transparency and create a compensation framework for victims of dishonest acts by consultants. The rules take effect July 15, 2026.

The changes will allow the College to strengthen its complaints and discipline process, including through increased penalties for consultants who break the rules. They will also require more information to be posted on the College’s public register of licensed consultants beginning in April 2027, making it easier for applicants to verify whether someone offering immigration advice is properly licensed.

The regulations also add new reporting requirements for the College, clarify investigation rules, give the minister power to appoint someone to take over board duties if the board fails to meet its responsibilities and establish guidelines for a compensation fund for victims who suffer financial loss because of dishonest acts by consultants.

“People looking to build their future in Canada deserve access to honest and reliable immigration and citizenship advice,” Diab said. “They need to have confidence that our government is taking effective steps to improve integrity.”

“These changes reflect our commitment to protecting applicants from fraud and misconduct, and to supporting a system where consultants are held to high standards,” she said.

Kate Lamb, interim president and chief executive officer of the College of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants, said the regulations strengthen the tools available to the regulator.

“The College remains committed to regulating the profession in the public interest and welcomes continued collaboration with our government partners to ensure that the regulations and associated operational, governance and communications structures uphold a system that is transparent and accountable,” Lamb said.

The move comes at a sensitive time for Canada’s immigration system, which is under pressure from backlogs, housing concerns, international student policy changes and growing public anxiety over fraud. For applicants overseas, the stakes are often life-changing. Many rely on paid advisers because Canada’s immigration rules are complex, the application process is intimidating and the consequences of a mistake can be severe.

Under Canadian law, anyone who accepts payment to provide immigration advice or prepare an immigration application must be licensed. But much of the recruitment ecosystem sits outside Canada, where education agents and offshore advisers often operate beyond the practical reach of Canadian regulators.

The PIE News, an international education publication, reported that the changes have been welcomed by some stakeholders for giving the regulator “more teeth,” but others questioned how far they will go in practice.

Matthew McDonald, a regulated Canadian immigration consultant, told The PIE News many in his sector support the spirit of the regulations but see them as “more about optics than substance,” especially in the context of the Carney government’s repeated language about “taking control” of the immigration system.

McDonald said the regulations may help victims harmed by licensed consultants, but they do little to stop abuse by unauthorized practitioners overseas.

“The Canadian government and education sector have long turned a blind eye to the many global education agents who will continue to work as unauthorised practitioners,” he told The PIE News.

Carina Dipti Mathur, founder of Canada Immigration and Visa in Singapore, told The PIE News the changes mark a “major turning point” for the industry. But she also warned that many overseas agencies remain focused mainly on recruitment without proper immigration and compliance support.

She estimated that only about 10 per cent of agencies involved in Canada recruitment across parts of Southeast Asia are directly connected to licensed structures or immigration lawyers.

“The new regulations will likely push more agencies to either partner properly with licensed professionals or step away from providing immigration advice altogether,” she said.