They took your money. They put no name on your file.

What is a "ghost consultant"?

A ghost consultant takes payment to advise on, prepare, or submit an immigration application without being legally authorized to do so. Under Canadian law (IRPA section 91), only three types of people can be paid for Canadian immigration advice:

Anyone outside these three categories who charges you for immigration help is operating illegally — no matter how confident, experienced, or "well-connected" they claim to be. The name "ghost" fits because these operators stay deliberately invisible: they rarely appear on your application forms, and many instruct clients to sign as though they prepared everything themselves, making the fraud harder to trace back.

Why Surrey & Toronto are especially targeted

Both cities have dense, tight-knit immigrant communities where word-of-mouth carries enormous weight — a cousin, a family friend, or a "well-known" community figure often gets trusted purely on reputation, with nobody checking their actual licence status. Ghost consultants exploit exactly this trust, often operating from informal offices, travel agencies, or private homes, and advertising heavily on social media and WhatsApp groups targeting Punjabi, Hindi, and other South Asian-speaking communities across Surrey and the Greater Toronto Area.

Red flags that signal a fake agent

The common thread: a genuine, licensed professional is always comfortable being checked. Someone who resists verification is telling you something important.

Verify an RCIC in two minutes

Before you pay anyone for immigration advice in Surrey, Toronto, or anywhere in Canada, check the free CICC public register at college-ic.ca.

1. Go to the CICC public register.
2. Search by the consultant's full legal name, their company name, or their licence number (an "R" followed by six digits, e.g. R123456).
3. Confirm the record shows them as a Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultant with status "active" and "in good standing."
4. Check that the name on the register exactly matches the name that will appear on your application forms.
5. If the licence type is a RISIA (Regulated International Student Immigration Advisor), note it only covers student-specific matters, not general immigration advice.

If the person doesn't appear on the register, refuses to give a licence number, or the details don't match — that's a serious red flag. Walk away, no matter how convincing the pitch.

What happens if you use an unlicensed agent

The consequences fall on you, not the ghost consultant — you remain fully responsible for everything submitted in your own application.

Already been misled? Do this

1. Gather every piece of evidence — receipts, message threads, contracts, and copies of anything submitted on your behalf.
2. Report to the CICC if the person claimed to be a licensed consultant, using the College's official complaint form.
3. Contact the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre at 1-888-495-8501 to report the financial fraud.
4. File a police report if you experienced financial loss.
5. Notify IRCC directly through their webform if your application is still in process and may contain false information — correcting the record proactively is far better than IRCC discovering it independently.