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The vacancy has been open for months, the only strong candidate is overseas, and nobody in the company has done this before. Here is what Ontario employment law and federal immigration law together require before that person can lawfully start.
Book My 15-Minute Assessment →A foreign national may only work in Canada with authorisation. The employer who lets someone start before the permit is issued is exposed under section 124 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, and the worker risks losing status.
An Ontario employer hires a foreign worker in one of two ways: by obtaining a Labour Market Impact Assessment from Employment and Social Development Canada under section 203 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Regulations, or by relying on an exemption in sections 204 to 208, such as a CUSMA professional or an intra-company transferee. The exempt route still requires an offer of employment filed through the Employer Portal.
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A foreign national may not work in Canada unless authorised to do so. Work is defined broadly in section 2 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Regulations as an activity for which wages are paid or commission is earned, or that competes directly with the activities of Canadian citizens or permanent residents in the labour market. Unpaid work in a competitive role can therefore still be work. An employer who employs a person it knows or ought to know is not authorised commits an offence under section 124 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, quite apart from the administrative consequences under the Regulations.
That is why the sequence matters. Status is confirmed first, the offer is written to match, and only then is a start date promised. In practice the most common Ontario mistake is the opposite: a signed offer with a fixed start date, a candidate who cannot lawfully be there, and an employer facing either a breach of contract exposure or an unlawful start. Neither outcome is necessary if the immigration analysis is done before the offer letter is issued.
Ontario employers also carry a second layer. The Employment Standards Act, 2000 applies to a foreign worker exactly as it applies to anyone else, and the Employment Protection for Foreign Nationals Act, 2009 goes further: it prohibits recruiters from charging fees to foreign nationals, prohibits employers from recovering recruitment costs from the worker, and prohibits the taking of a worker's property, including passports and work permits. Compliance with provincial employment and recruitment law is itself a federal condition under sections 209.2 and 209.3 of the Regulations, so an Ontario breach becomes a federal immigration violation.
Before any application is contemplated, check what the candidate holds. A permanent resident or Canadian citizen needs nothing. A holder of an open work permit, most commonly a post-graduation work permit or a spousal open work permit, can generally be hired with no immigration filing by the employer at all, subject to any conditions printed on the permit. A holder of an employer-specific permit naming a different company cannot simply move; a new permit is required, and starting before it is issued is unauthorised work.
Verification is a document exercise, not a conversation. Ask for the physical work permit, read the employer, occupation and location conditions printed on it, note the expiry date, and diarise a renewal review at least four months out. Where a worker has applied to extend before expiry, maintained status allows them to continue working under the conditions of the expired permit while the application is pending, but that protection is lost if the application was filed late or if the person leaves Canada. Employers should keep a copy of the permit and of the extension receipt.
The Ontario Human Rights Code prohibits discrimination in employment on the basis of citizenship, place of origin and ethnic origin. An employer may ask whether a candidate is legally entitled to work in Canada and may require proof of authorisation before employment begins. An employer should not ask about national origin, immigration history or citizenship status as a screening question, and should not treat permanent residents less favourably than citizens.
If the candidate has no existing authorisation, the employer chooses between the Temporary Foreign Worker Program, which requires a Labour Market Impact Assessment under section 203, and the International Mobility Program, which relies on an exemption in sections 204 to 208. The exempt route is faster, cheaper and does not require advertising, but it is available only where the facts fit a defined provision. Wanting an exemption does not create one.
| Situation | Likely pathway | Employer filing |
|---|---|---|
| United States or Mexican citizen in a listed profession | CUSMA professional, section 204(a) | Employer Portal offer, $230 fee |
| Manager transferring from a related company abroad | Intra-company transferee | Employer Portal offer, $230 fee |
| Technology role on the Global Talent Occupations List | Global Talent Stream, LMIA | LMIA plus Labour Market Benefits Plan, $1,000 |
| Skilled trade or general vacancy, no exemption available | High-wage or low-wage LMIA stream | Advertising, then LMIA, $1,000 |
| Candidate nominated by Ontario for permanent residence | Provincial support, section 204(b) | Nomination file, then work permit support |
| Recent graduate of a Canadian institution | Post-graduation work permit, already open | None; verify the permit |
| Spouse of a skilled worker or student | Spousal open work permit, if eligible | None; verify the permit |
Eligibility for spousal open work permits was narrowed in 2025 and now depends on the principal worker's occupation and on how much validity remains on their permit, so a spouse who would have qualified two years ago may not qualify today. This is a good illustration of why pathway selection should be confirmed at the time of hire rather than repeated from a previous file.
Where an LMIA is required, the recruitment file is built before the application. ESDC generally requires advertising on the national Job Bank plus at least two additional methods appropriate to the occupation, running for a minimum of four weeks within the three months preceding the application, with the advertisement remaining active until a decision is made. The advertisement must state the business name, the work location, the wage or wage range, the hours, the benefits, the job duties and the requirements. Every Canadian and permanent resident applicant must be assessed, and the employer must be able to explain, individually, why each was not hired.
The wage drives everything else. Whether an application falls into the high-wage or low-wage stream is determined by comparing the offered wage to the median hourly wage published by ESDC for the occupation and region, and the applicable stream then dictates the additional obligations, including any employer-paid transportation, housing or health insurance requirements and any cap on the proportion of temporary foreign workers at the work location. Offering below the prevailing wage for the occupation and region is a refusal ground under the factors in section 203(3).
For LMIA-exempt hires, the equivalent step is the Employer Portal. The employer creates an account, submits the offer of employment describing the position, wage, hours, location and duties, pays the $230 employer compliance fee, and receives an offer of employment number that the worker quotes in the permit application. That submission is a formal representation. If the employment later differs from what was entered, the difference is measured against the portal record.
Once the worker starts, the employer must remain actively engaged in the business, must pay wages and provide working conditions substantially the same as, but not less favourable than, those offered, must employ the person in the same occupation, must comply with employment and recruitment law, and must make reasonable efforts to provide a workplace free of abuse. The employer must keep supporting documents for six years and must report for and cooperate with any inspection.
Ordinary business events can put those conditions under strain. A promotion changes the occupation. A restructuring changes the work location. A wage freeze creates a gap against the offered wage. A layoff raises whether the employer remains actively engaged in the business for which the offer was made. None of these events is prohibited, but each needs to be assessed against the filed offer, documented at the time, and where necessary corrected by a new application or a new portal submission. Employers who treat the work permit as a one-time transaction are the ones who are surprised three years later.
The direct government cost is modest and predictable. An LMIA application is $1,000 for each position requested, payable by the employer, non-refundable and not recoverable from the worker. An LMIA-exempt hire attracts a $230 employer compliance fee per offer of employment submitted through the Employer Portal. The worker pays their own work permit processing fee and, where applicable, biometrics. Advertising costs, credential assessments and any recruitment agency fees sit on top.
The real cost is time. An LMIA route cannot begin until four weeks of advertising have run, and that is before ESDC processing and before the worker applies for a permit. An exempt route can be filed within days of the decision to hire, and for some nationalities and categories the permit can be issued at a port of entry. Employers planning a start date should work backwards from the slowest step in the chosen pathway rather than from the date the offer was signed.
Budget also for the people around the worker. A candidate relocating with a family will ask whether their spouse can work and whether their children can attend school. Spousal open work permit eligibility depends on the principal worker's occupation and remaining permit validity, and minor children generally require study permits above a certain age. These answers routinely determine whether the candidate accepts, so they should be researched before the offer rather than after.
The first is treating the work permit as the worker's problem. The employer is a regulated party with its own conditions, its own six-year retention obligation and its own exposure to penalties and bans. The second is copying a job description from a previous application. Occupational classification drives the wage test, the advertising requirements and, on an exempt file, whether the category applies at all, so it has to be done against the duties this person will actually perform.
The third is writing an employment agreement that contradicts the immigration filing. If the contract permits reassignment to any location and the filing names one site, the contract has created a variance the day it is signed. The fourth is letting managers make informal accommodations, such as reduced hours during a slow quarter, without checking them against the offered terms. The fifth is losing the paperwork: permits stored on a personal drive, payroll archived by a former bookkeeper, advertising screenshots never taken.
None of these are exotic legal problems. They are administrative failures with legal consequences, and each is solved by deciding at the outset who in the organisation owns the foreign worker file, what that person keeps, and when they review it. Employers who assign that ownership rarely have inspection problems. Employers who do not, eventually do.
A sixth error deserves separate mention because it is the most expensive: assuming that a corporate change is invisible to immigration. A share purchase generally leaves the employer entity intact and existing employer-specific permits continue to name a company that still exists. An asset purchase does not, because the workers become employees of a different legal entity and permits naming the vendor no longer authorise the employment. The same issue arises on an amalgamation, a reorganisation into a new operating company, or a transfer of staff between related entities. Each should be reviewed for immigration effect before it is implemented.
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