Quick Question about Canadian Employment

thomaska

Council Member
May 24, 2006
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Does Canada have similar law to the U.S. about having to be a citizen of Canada to work there legally? Or have have work visa or whatever. You can't just show up from Latvia or some other country and just start working, can you?
 

the caracal kid

the clan of the claw
Nov 28, 2005
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you need citizenship or a visa to work in canada, legally. Then of course there is the issue with many accreditations not being accepted in canada (there is some truth to the joke about Ph.Ds driving taxis in toronto)
 

thomaska

Council Member
May 24, 2006
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you need citizenship or a visa to work in canada, legally. Then of course there is the issue with many accreditations not being accepted in canada (there is some truth to the joke about Ph.Ds driving taxis in toronto)


Cool, I'm going to assume that citizenship is verified when being hired then, correct? Or at least it should be, right?
 

the caracal kid

the clan of the claw
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I beleive it is "impossible" to legally be hired without a SIN number, but that might be the only "check" for a non-visa worker. I would bet there are a fair number of fake SINs in use as well as I don't think you have to produce the card, but just provide the number (which is verifiable by a publicly available checksum calculation, so anybody can make a checksum-valid number up).

The only time I have ever been asked to prove my citizenship was for obtaining a passport (and supposedly it is easy enough to get reprints of birth certs...)
 

sanctus

The Padre
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I beleive it is "impossible" to legally be hired without a SIN number, but that might be the only "check" for a non-visa worker. I would bet there are a fair number of fake SINs in use as well as I don't think you have to produce the card, but just provide the number (which is verifiable by a publicly available checksum calculation, so anybody can make a checksum-valid number up).

The only time I have ever been asked to prove my citizenship was for obtaining a passport (and supposedly it is easy enough to get reprints of birth certs...)


True. When a person is hired they must supply a SIN number or they cannot be processed as an employee.
 

thomaska

Council Member
May 24, 2006
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fraud charge, denial of employment?. probably the same outcome if someone were to do that in the US.


I'm glad you brought that up. Because I'm wondering if Canadian politicians would act the same way this congressman is acting...

A Mississippi Democrat in line to become chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee has warned the nation's largest uniform supplier it faces criminal charges if it follows a White House proposal to recheck workers with mismatched Social Security numbers and fire those who cannot resolve the discrepancy in 60 days. Rep. Bennie Thompson said in a letter to Cintas Corp. it could be charged with "illegal activities in violation of state and federal law" if any of its 32,000 employees are terminated because they gave incorrect Social Security numbers to be hired.
"I am deeply troubled by Cintas' recent policy change regarding the Social Security Administration's 'no match' letters," Mr. Thompson said in the Nov. 2 letter. "It is my understanding that hundreds of Cintas' immigrant workers have received these letters. I am extremely concerned about any potentially discriminatory actions targeting this community."
http://washingtontimes.com/national/20061128-122911-2961r.htm

I don't think it is wrong to terminate the employment of illeagal immigrants, or criminals who used false information to obtain employment. Anyone have any thoughts on this?

What if a crimnal faked a SIN number and got the job you wanted?
 

the caracal kid

the clan of the claw
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have you ever heard of that happening, sanctus?

Its not the type of thing that would make "the news" so its a good question as to how much such fraud occurs, how much is processed, and how many people are actually penalized for it.

Is it like taxes, where only a random sampling are crosschecked for validity? I have never seen a company actively verify who they hire. I have heard of people having multiple SINs, all issued by the gov even that isn't supposed to be happening either.

On a trivial sidenote on SINs, the first digit is a geographic marker of where you lived when you were issued a card. I forget how the regions are numbered though.
 

DurkaDurka

Internet Lawyer
Mar 15, 2006
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I'm glad you brought that up. Because I'm wondering if Canadian politicians would act the same way this congressman is acting...
A Mississippi Democrat in line to become chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee has warned the nation's largest uniform supplier it faces criminal charges if it follows a White House proposal to recheck workers with mismatched Social Security numbers and fire those who cannot resolve the discrepancy in 60 days. Rep. Bennie Thompson said in a letter to Cintas Corp. it could be charged with "illegal activities in violation of state and federal law" if any of its 32,000 employees are terminated because they gave incorrect Social Security numbers to be hired.
"I am deeply troubled by Cintas' recent policy change regarding the Social Security Administration's 'no match' letters," Mr. Thompson said in the Nov. 2 letter. "It is my understanding that hundreds of Cintas' immigrant workers have received these letters. I am extremely concerned about any potentially discriminatory actions targeting this community."
http://washingtontimes.com/national/20061128-122911-2961r.htm

I don't think it is wrong to terminate the employment of illeagal immigrants, or criminals who used false information to obtain employment. Anyone have any thoughts on this?

What if a crimnal faked a SIN number and got the job you wanted?

If people deliberately fake a SIN number for employment, I'm all for them being fired and or charged.
 

sanctus

The Padre
Oct 27, 2006
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have you ever heard of that happening, sanctus?

Its not the type of thing that would make "the news" so its a good question as to how much such fraud occurs, how much is processed, and how many people are actually penalized for it.
.

Actually yes. Some years back we hired a lady for cleaning at a parish I was at at the time. I cannot remember exactly how it came about, but it turned out her SIN was from a dead person, not even related to her. She had had credit cards using this number and all sorts of things. Rev. Canada advised us we could not continue to keep her as an employee. I understand she had to pay severe fines, for this is considered fraud by Revenue Canada. Lost track of what exactly happened after that. This was back in 1997-98 so the memory is sketchy.:)
 

TenPenny

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Jun 9, 2004
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Actually yes. Some years back we hired a lady for cleaning at a parish I was at at the time. I cannot remember exactly how it came about, but it turned out her SIN was from a dead person, not even related to her. She had had credit cards using this number and all sorts of things. Rev. Canada advised us we could not continue to keep her as an employee. I understand she had to pay severe fines, for this is considered fraud by Revenue Canada. Lost track of what exactly happened after that. This was back in 1997-98 so the memory is sketchy.:)
It might take a while, but at some point, the employer has to submit tax summary info for income tax. If Revenue Canada discovers that the SIN that the employer is deducting against is not valid, then they will go back to the employer.