Once you’ve submitted your application for your citizenship certificate, you can track the status of your application. This helps you understand whether your application is ever held up, especially if you’ve requested urgent processing due to an emergency or other urgent situation where you need fast-tracking for your certificate application.
Let’s see how to do it.
How to Check the Status of Your First/Replacement Citizenship Certificate Application
If you filed your application on paper from inside Canada or the US
Go here to this IRCC page and answer a series of questions. In the image below, we’ve assumed that the application is for a citizenship certificate filed on paper and from Canada or the United States and that the Acknowledgement of Receipt or AOL has been received. This is what your questions look like:
You’ll then see the following just below on the same page:
As we’ve highlighted for you, you’ll have to contact your embassy/consulate/high commission to get your UCI and application number in order to track your application’s status. When you have them, then return to this page and click the blue Check the client application status tool button.
Need an easier way to get a replacement citizenship certificate?
Why not get some support?
1. We make sure everything is perfect! No returned applications.
2. We track and deal with the government for you. Try calling IRCC yourself. It’s a mess.
3. Need your document fast? Again, we can help.
If you filed your application on paper from Outside Canada or the US
Go to the same IRCC page linked above and answer the questions as before, except for the question asking where you filed from, which you should respond with Outside Canada and the United States.
After clicking the blue Continue button, you’ll see the following lower down on the same page:
If you filed your application online
In this case, on the same page linked above, when you answer online for how you applied, you’ll see the following:
As you can see, when you file online, to check your status online, you log in to your IRCC Secure Account and then:
- Go to View my submitted applications or profiles, and then
- Click on Check status and messages.
TIP: Click here to find out about processing times.
Alternative Option – Contact the Government by Phone
Call this number 1-888-242-2100 – Monday to Friday from 8 am to 4 pm, eastern standard time. Please remember that this only works in Canada.
Note: Only do this if you have a speakerphone because you will be held for 45 minutes to 2 hours. As well, you should avoid calling at noon.
Tip: Here is an article about contacting IRCC from outside of Canada.
How to contact the Canadian Diplomatic mission to check the status of your Canadian citizenship certificate. (For applications from outside of Canada and the United States)
Here are the steps to take:
- Make sure you contact the same diplomatic mission you used to submit your citizenship certificate application.
- Go here to access a list of Canadian diplomatic missions abroad. For example, if you click on United Kingdom from the list of countries, you will be taken here, and you can then find the contact information for the Embassy in London:
It is a better idea to use this contact information (for the diplomatic mission you submitted your certificate application to) to find out your UCI and application number. Contacting the diplomatic mission to track your application will likely result in delays and usually won’t provide you with practical, up-to-date information on your application’s status. You can always try, however.
FAQs
I keep calling IRCC, but they tell me my application hasn’t even been started processing yet. What’s wrong?
When IRCC gets your application, it sits in the mailroom until it is picked up and assigned to an immigration officer or department. This often means that 90% of the time, when you call, your application has not been given to a case officer yet, so it will not be on the system. Here are your options:
- After 6-8 months, if your application is still not on the system, consider refiling your application. It will not affect your first application. You should only do this if you have doubts about how you first sent the application.
- Pay a third party to just look after this. They will look after tracking.
Need an easier way to get a replacement citizenship certificate?
Why not get some support?
1. We make sure everything is perfect! No returned applications.
2. We track and deal with the government for you. Try calling IRCC yourself. It’s a mess.
3. Need your document fast? Again, we can help.
Riley Haas has been a leading expert since 2011 on immigration matters, with hundreds of publications online. Published author of three books about political philosophy, the Beatles and the Toronto Maple Leafs, respectively. BA from Bishop’s University, MA from McMaster University. You follow Riley on Substack https://rileyhaas.substack.com.
