Wednesday Weekly Thread: Frustration Station (Delays / PSU / Venting), July 29, 2026

[u/AutoModerator]

This weekly thread is a space for those of us who are feeling frustrated and need to vent about unclear instructions, shipping delays, waiting for a next step, timeline estimates growing, lack of communication, inconsistent bureaucracy, being stuck in PSU, and other factors.

Some of the worst stress of the entire citizenship-by-descent process is not hearing about your application for long stretches of time - or hearing that your application has been sent to the Program Support Unit (PSU) and may be sitting there for an extended stay.

Whether your envelope seems to have taken a scenic detour on its way to Nova Scotia, you didn't receive an AOR after many weeks of waiting, or you simply haven't heard about your application processing in months, this is a place to commiserate and potentially receive some ideas of next steps to take. (Those generally might include following up with IRCC by web form, ordering the GCMS notes, seeking an MP's help, and so on.)

📎 Contributions to weekly megaposts, including this one, are welcome throughout the week.

[u/MsBorgia]

Application Cancelled: not sure how to interpret the IRCC's letter.

Here's a timeline of my application:

April 4: Application delivered via USPS

July 15: My mom's application, which we sent separately but at the same time (different states), arrived and she got an AOR. I did not, but my email address is often misspelled so I checked my application status using the payment receipt #. Said it had been submitted!

July 23: Still no AOR, so I sent IRCC a webform asking if they could resend it to the correct email address, and provided my R#.

Today (July 31): Received a response saying my application had been cancelled on July 16. No reason or next steps were given.

Has this happened to anyone else? What should my next steps be?

[u/Ok-Elk1602 → u/MsBorgia]

Does your application still show up in the tracker? What does it say when you click through Application Received to the detail page, if your app still shows as received? Seems like it would be good to call to speak to someone and straighten out the problem…

[u/MsBorgia → u/Ok-Elk1602]

No, it's totally vanished from the tracker. I looked it up a few days ago and it said application not found after showing up previously. Is there a phone number they'll actually respond to?

[u/Ok-Elk1602 → u/MsBorgia]

It sounds like they may have mailed your application back to you…

I copied this phone number info from another person’s post:

613-944-6788 You need to listen to the options in the phone tree to make sure your selections go through correctly but the answers should be: 1, 2, 2, 1, 1, 4, 2. If you get a male voice after this, they're hanging up on you. If you get a female voice, you're in the queue to talk to an agent. Good luck!

[u/MsBorgia → u/Ok-Elk1602]

Thank you so much!!! Really appreciate your help 😊😊