Introducing the expression of interest system for Ontario’s 5 immigration streams

Ontario is changing its economic group 5 immigration stream registration system in the coming weeks. Instead of the previous service priority model based on registration time, the Ontario Immigrant Nominee Program (OINP) is moving to a points-based expression of interest (EOI) system that ranks applicants based on human capital and labor market factors. Many Provincial Nominee Programs (PNPs) currently use such a system to manage new enrollees.

OINP will apply the new EOI system to the following streams:

Streams of the employer’s job offer group (foreign workforce, international students and required skills)

The flow of graduates of the master’s course

Flow of PhD graduates

While OINP is changing the system, these streams are currently closed to new applicants and will reopen once the new EOI system is up and running in the coming weeks. OINP did not inform the exact date of reopening of these streams.

How to change immigration to Ontario with the EOI system

The immigration flows that change to the EOI registration system used to determine the review priority based on the time of registration. Ontario will open its online portal to accept registrations from people who wish to immigrate through one of these Ontario provincial programs.

Due to high demand, these registration portals usually reach their maximum capacity within a few minutes. There have been other problems, OINP had to assign an email to people who had technical problems affecting registration, and some complained that the system was not fair to people with poor internet connections.

EOI systems are used by many other provincial selection programs. Usually, this system asks applicants to submit a resume along with their work experience, education and other information. After that, they will receive a provincial score and if their score is high enough, they will be invited to apply for the selection of a province for permanent residence.

In the fall of 2020, Ontario began accepting public comments on the new EOI system, and received mostly positive feedback.

This province received 250 feedbacks from September 9 to October 23, 2020. These feedbacks were sent from different people, future applicants, employers, representatives and immigration organizations and industrial societies.

Many respondents believed that the proposed EOI system would be fairer, more predictable and better for users than the current adoption process.