Complaints

The complaint text that is displayed might not represent all complaints filed with BBB. Some consumers may elect to not publish the details of their complaints, some complaints may not meet BBB's standards for publication, or BBB may display a portion of complaints when a high volume is received for a particular business.

• Initial Complaint

  Date:01/05/2023

  Type:Service or Repair Issues
  Status:

  UnansweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  I'm requesting help in reaching a resolution with GNV after failed attempts to find one. See timeline of issues and reasons. Extra details in documents too large for submission, can provide upon request.June 2022: initiated contact with GNV for immigration consultation June 2022 - December 2023: paid GNV totaling $18,290.00 USD GNV committed to:" Full Lifetime Assistance with assembling of pertinent information and supporting documents for the kind of service mentioned here above. Full orientation, guidance and support with regards to any government requirements who are formally published by the ******** Government. Technical ********** services in the Express Entry System Application, including opening a profile ** the ******** job bank. Dedicated customer support team. Reporting to Client in a timely manner." Issues June 2022 - March 2023:1. Poor and untimely communication (up to 2 weeks no reply)2. Poor attention to detail 3. Poor customer service, rude and condescending phone calls 4. Insufficient and inaccurate explanations for services being provided and for what cost 5. Questions not answered 6. Promises of a strong case, not needing a job offer and inaccurate timelines 7. Advised to sell home and find temporary housing to prepare for move (house sold without any move opportunity as promised)8. Pushed to pay for more services that were not desired 9. No official invoices provided when requested 10. Critical error made by GNV that made applications ineligible for approval 11. Unauthorized changes made by GNV resulting in denied applications 12. No services provided for final payment of $3,500.00 USD for provincial programs March 30, 2023 - email sent to terminate relationship and services as allowed per GNV terms and conditions (section ****) March 30, 2023 - April 22, 2023: correspondence from GNV offer to continue services ignoring request for termination April 23, 2023: final email sent to GNV with no reply to date

• Initial Complaint

  Date:08/11/2022

  Type:Service or Repair Issues
  Status:

  AnsweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  I am a dual citizen (by descent) of Canada and the United States. I obtained my Canadian citizenship on my own in 2018. I and my husband who is a U.S. citizen embarked on moving to Montreal Canada this year from NYC. I enlisted the aid of Great North **** so that an **** (as they indicate on their website) would assist us with the paperwork and the application submission for family sponsorship spousal class. When we arrived in Montreal on September 11th to facilitate the move of our property we were informed by a customs agent with immigration at YUL that there was no **** application submitted on our behalf, even though we paid an additional $3000 to prioritize the submission. This was three months into the process of us supplying all sorts of information and documents. I immediately contacted our Senior account Manager Daniel K****** at Great North **** who became emphatic that border control agents don't have access to **** status. When I asked about proof of submission he stated that there was no way to track the application. Alarmed, I went to the CICC website and discovered Mr. K****** is not listed as a credentialed ****. He is not even authorized to represent us or submit a **** application on our behalf. I filed a report there. My call to Great North **** to speak to a supervisor was given lip service. No one called me back to address this issue. The only call I received was from custom relations (Gabriela D******) when they discovered I contacted my credit card company to dispute the charges. Immediately I took it upon myself to initiate the family sponsorship process as there was absolutely no record of a submitted residency application. We filled out copious paperwork, collected fingerprints, police reports and went for biometrics, all processes GNV and Daniel K****** failed to address. Clearly we were victims of a scam. Unfortunately my credit card company has been swayed by their corporate presentation and has not rendered a refund.

  Business Response

  Date: 09/11/2022

  To whom this may concern,
  
  Ms. ****** started her **** process with us on June 6th, 2022. We were collecting necessary information and documents for her application process until September 20th, 2022. The day after she decided to cancel the process due to the information she provided in her complaint.
  
  To address her claims, Great North **** does exclusively subcontract fully authorized Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultants. These are consultants of good standing, certified by the Immigration Consultants of Canada Regulatory Authority (ICCRC). This information can be found here: https://www.greatnorth****.com/about-us/. However, Ms. ******'s case was not assigned to an **** yet because she did not complete the necessary information required to submit her application. This means that her application was not yet lodged at the time she was looking into her application status with border control and the CICC website. Mr. Kennedy also explained to her that she will not find any information about her application with border control because they are only aware of approved ****s, and as mentioned, her application was not even lodged yet.
  
  In addition, Mr. K****** never proclaimed to be an ****, so this seems to be Ms. ******'s own assumptions that led to this misunderstanding. As mentioned, because the case was incomplete it was never assigned to an ****, with whom she would have signed a retainer before proceeding to submission.
  
  Lastly, Ms. ****** never informed us that she wanted to cancel the process before she made a chargeback, which is why only at this point Ms. D****** from customer relations reached out to find out what happened. If we were aware of her concerns about the process we would have gladly clarified the status of her process and reassured her.
  
  This being said, we are saddend by the situation that transpired and that Ms. ****** felt that she had to continue the process on her own. If we can assist with anything else, please let us know.
  
  Kind regards,
  Great North ****

  Customer Answer

  Date: 09/11/2022

  
  Complaint: 18374208
  
  I am rejecting this response because: I was never informed that the Sr. Account Manager Daniel K****** was not an ****. Nor does he indicate when I contacted him on September 11th, upon being told by border control that there was no **** application submitted into the system, that a **** application was in fact not submitted. Rather, based on the email exchange from September 12th, which I submitted with this consumer complaint, Mr. K****** indicates that "Generally the officers are the border control would only be aware of approved ****'s not applications being processed by the ICCRC, these are different and non-correlated parts of the government." Here he suggests the **** application was submitted but border control would not be privy to that information. Neither statement is true.

  When I asked Mr. K****** for a tracking # or proof of submission Mr. K****** replied via email, "Unfortunately there is no way to track the application, although I expect out Immigration Department to reach out shortly for the collection of additional documentation." Again, these are false statements. I obtained my Canadian citizenship on my own in 2018. Every step of the way I tracked the processing of my application with immigration. IRCC sends notifications of submission even prior to an application being processed. So why was I not afforded this proof? Clearly, because there was no application ever submitted, because Mr. K****** is not authorized to submit an application on our behalf. Now suddenly GNV has spun it that some other person in their company who actually has **** licensure would eventually be submitting our application.

  Given that three months into the process and over $9,000 USD later (in spite of $3000 I paid to fast track the **** application) an application was nowhere to be found in IRCC. It took us three weeks of working day and night to submit all paperwork, biometrics, FBI report, etc. Only now do we have a family sponsorship **** in the system being processed. At the very least we should receive a full refund for being misled and lied to. Had we not terminated this arrangement I have no doubt that GNC would have continued to scam us, causing us more difficulties down the road.

  
  Sincerely,
  
  ***** ******

  Business Response

  Date: 13/11/2022

  Dear Ms. ******,
  
  Thank you for your response.
  
  For your convenience, we will address your claims one by one:
  
  1. Mr. K****** never presented himself as an ****, as also stated by you. This is because we assign an **** at the submission stage, which you have not reached due to missing information.
  2. Mr. K****** never said that your application was submitted, as per your email correspondence. He is correct by saying that the office of border control would only be aware of approved **** applications. As your application has not been submitted, there would have been no record of it anywhere. However, we understand that there may have been some misinterpertation and we are sorry to learn about this, as clarifying these matters could have been done much sooner.
  3. As stated earlier, your **** application was not submitted yet so Mr. K****** could not have provided your login details and tracking number. He says: "I expect out Immigration Department to reach out shortly for the collection of additional documentation" in reference to the missing information required to complete your case.
  
  We would like to express our sincere apologies once more for this situation. We did not intend to cause any inconvenience and we make the utmost efforts to reflect the processes as clearly as possible.
  We would have been happy to provide you with further explanations about your case and reassure you.
  
  Please feel free to contact us if you have any further questions or thoughts.
  
  Kind regards,
  Great North ****

  Customer Answer

  Date: 14/11/2022

  
  Complaint: 18374208
  
  I am rejecting this response because: This organization is clearly not capable or interested in owning up to their duplicity or compensating me the $3000 paid to fast track an application that was never submitted. In one month's time in Quebec my husband and I filed an application with immigration for family sponsorship. I am now submitting the undertaking to the Quebec province. It was obvious from the correspondence that Mr. K****** did not say that the application was not submitted. Rather he was conveying that the application could not be tracked. No one ever apprised us that there would be a prolonged collection of documents that would down the road be transferred to an ****. Yet GNV suddenly claims regret over these circumstances? If they are so remorseful than they can refund me the money they robbed me of.
  
  Sincerely,
  
  ***** ******

  Business Response

  Date: 21/11/2022

  Dear Ms. ******,
  
  

  We hope this finds you well.
  
  
  We acknowledged your complaint and the reasons that you are not entitled to a full refund in our previous messages to you.

  Mr. K****** was clear that your application hasn't been submitted yet because of missing information. Shortly after, you received an email from our immigration team about the missing information required to complete your case.

  Great North **** cannot be held responsible if our clients decide to continue pursuing a **** on their own after they have started their application process with us. As per our Terms and Conditions, which are readily available on our website and for which you signed for, this does not entitle our clients to a refund.

  This being said, we extend our apologies again for any misunderstandings that occured during your process with us.

  If you will require assistance in the future, we would be happy to provide it.

  
  Kind regards,

  
  Great North ****

  Customer Answer

  Date: 21/11/2022

  
  Complaint: 18374208
  
  I am rejecting this response because: The company claims I am not deserving of a refund, even the $3000 spent on an application that was never submitted. Suddenly our account manager was not an **** and the onus was on me for thinking he would be. They are sinister people who know how to scam unsuspecting immigrants. Irrespective of what GNV decides to do I will not rescind my complain as I am certain that they acted duplicitously. Hence, others who investigate their rating on the BBC deserve to know of their unscrupulous activity.
  
  Sincerely,
  
  ***** ******

• Initial Complaint

  Date:20/09/2022

  Type:Product Issues
  Status:

  ResolvedMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  In April 2021, I applied for Permanent Residency from Bermuda through Great North **** and sent them US$10,000 upon assurance that my Permanent Residency would come through in 9 months to 1 year. Despite the fact that this had not happened, I travelled to Canada June 10, 2022 and had my biometrics done June 13 as per instructions from Great North ****. I have not heard anything from them since then. I have tried to reach them numerous times, both through email and telephone. In each case, it is stated that they will return my email/phone call within 48 hours - hasn't happened. In frustration, I visited their physical address and, not only were they not on the building directory, but nobody had ever heard of them I'm starting to fear a scam. through Great North **** and sent them US$10,000 and they assured me that I would have my Permanent Residency from 9 months to a year. Despite not having my Permanent Residency, I travelled to Canada on June 10, 2022 and completed my biometrics June 13, 2022 as per instructions from Great North ****. I haven't heard from them since, despite several attempts to contact them by email and phone. In each case, I am told by a recording that they will get back to me within 48 hours - not happening. Out of frustration, I visited their physical address; not only were they not on the building directory, but no one there had every heard of them. I'm now afraid that this is a scam

  Business Response

  Date: 21/09/2022

  Dear **********,
  
  Thank you for sharing your experience with us. We're sorry to learn that it hasn't been satisfactory.
  
  Looking into your case, we found that your visa application was submitted around 4 months ago, on May 13th, 2022.
  As per Ms. ********* email to you on September 18th, 2022, we have yet to receive a response from the government regarding the approval of your visa application.
  
  We understand your concerns and we hope that this clarifies the matter.
  Kindly note that processing times for visa applications are estimated and may be subject to change according to the government.
  
  Please reach out to us at any time if you have any further questions or thoughts.
  
  Great North ****

  Customer Answer

  Date: 26/09/2022

   
  Better Business Bureau:
  
  I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID ********, and find that this resolution is satisfactory to me.
  
  Sincerely,
  
  ********** ********