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An LMIA is not a form. It is an evidentiary case that your recruitment was genuine, your wage is at or above the prevailing rate, and hiring this person will have a neutral or positive effect on the Canadian labour market. Weak files are refused, and refusals are expensive.
Book My Consultation →The $1,000 LMIA processing fee is charged per position requested, is payable by the employer, is not refunded if the application is refused, and cannot lawfully be recovered from the foreign national.
A Labour Market Impact Assessment is Employment and Social Development Canada written opinion that hiring a foreign national will have a neutral or positive effect on the Canadian labour market. Section 203 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Regulations requires one before most employer-specific work permits are issued, unless an exemption in sections 204 to 208 applies, such as a CUSMA professional or an intra-company transferee.
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A Labour Market Impact Assessment is the written opinion of Employment and Social Development Canada that hiring a particular foreign national into a particular position will have a neutral or positive effect on the Canadian labour market. It exists because section 203 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Regulations requires an officer, before issuing most employer-specific work permits, to be satisfied on the basis of an ESDC assessment that the offer is genuine and that the employment meets the prescribed criteria.
Section 203(3) lists the factors on which that assessment is based. They include whether the employment is likely to result in the direct creation or retention of jobs for Canadians and permanent residents, whether it is likely to result in the development or transfer of skills and knowledge, whether it is likely to fill a labour shortage, whether the wages offered are consistent with the prevailing wage rate for the occupation and the working conditions meet generally accepted standards, whether the employer has made reasonable efforts to hire or train Canadians and permanent residents, and whether the employment is likely to adversely affect the settlement of a labour dispute or the employment of any person involved in one.
Genuineness is assessed separately under section 203(1.1), which asks whether the offer is made by an employer actively engaged in the business in respect of which the offer is made, whether the offer is consistent with the employer's reasonable employment needs, whether the employer is reasonably able to fulfil the terms of the offer, and whether the employer has complied with federal and provincial employment and recruitment law in the past. A genuine shortage documented poorly still fails. That is the gap counsel is retained to close.
The stream is set primarily by the wage. Where the offered wage is at or above the median hourly wage published by ESDC for the occupation in the province or territory, the application is processed in the high-wage stream. Below that threshold, it is a low-wage application, with additional employer obligations and additional restrictions. Specialised streams sit alongside these for technology occupations, agriculture, primary agriculture under the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program, and in-home caregiving.
| High-wage stream | Low-wage stream | Global Talent Stream | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wage test | At or above the provincial median hourly wage | Below the provincial median hourly wage | Prevailing wage for the occupation, often well above median |
| Advertising | Job Bank plus at least two other methods, minimum four weeks | Job Bank plus at least two other methods, minimum four weeks | Recruitment requirements are reduced or waived |
| Additional employer commitments | Commitments made in the application, assessed on inspection | Transportation, suitable housing where applicable, and health insurance obligations | Mandatory Labour Market Benefits Plan with committed outcomes |
| Caps and regional limits | Not generally capped | Subject to caps on the proportion of temporary foreign workers at a work location and to regional processing restrictions | Not capped |
| Service standard | Standard processing | Standard processing | Two weeks for eligible applications |
| Processing fee | $1,000 per position | $1,000 per position | $1,000 per position |
The caps and regional restrictions applied to the low-wage stream have changed repeatedly since 2024, including reductions in the permitted proportion of low-wage temporary foreign workers at a work location, exemptions for certain sectors, and refusals to process low-wage applications in regions with elevated unemployment. Any employer planning a low-wage hire should have the current settings confirmed before spending four weeks advertising.
Map the duties to the correct National Occupational Classification code and confirm the wage against the published median and prevailing rates. Getting the code wrong changes the stream, the wage test and the advertising requirements, and is a common cause of refusal.
Post on the national Job Bank plus at least two additional methods suited to the occupation, for a minimum of four consecutive weeks within the three months before filing. The advertisement must disclose the business name, location, wage, hours, benefits, duties and requirements.
Record each Canadian and permanent resident applicant, the screening decision and the reason. A recruitment summary that says only that no qualified candidates applied will not survive scrutiny.
Submit the application with business legitimacy documents, the recruitment file, the employment agreement, the attestations, and payment of $1,000 per position requested.
An ESDC officer may telephone the employer to test the genuineness of the offer. The person who answers should know the duties, the wage, the recruitment history and the business. Unprepared interviews sink otherwise sound applications.
A positive or neutral assessment is issued to the employer with a copy for the worker, who then applies for the work permit. The assessment has a limited validity period, so the permit application should follow promptly.
The Global Talent Stream runs on a different track. Category A is for firms referred by a designated partner that need unique and specialized talent; Category B is for occupations on the Global Talent Occupations List. Both require a Labour Market Benefits Plan committing the employer to outcomes such as job creation for Canadians, investment in skills and training, or knowledge transfer, and progress against that plan is reviewed. In exchange, eligible applications carry a two-week service standard and reduced recruitment requirements.
Most refusals trace to one of five problems. The occupational classification does not match the duties, so the wage and advertising were benchmarked against the wrong occupation. The advertising was incomplete, ran for less than the required period, omitted a mandatory element, or was placed on channels the officer does not accept for that occupation. The recruitment summary does not individually justify the rejection of domestic applicants. The requirements listed in the advertisement were tailored so tightly to the intended candidate that they screen out qualified Canadians. Or the employer could not demonstrate that it is actively engaged in the business and reasonably able to pay the offered wage.
There is no statutory appeal from a negative LMIA. The practical options are a fresh application built on a corrected record, which usually means advertising again, or an application to the Federal Court for judicial review of the decision under section 72 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, which requires leave and is generally limited to errors of law, breaches of procedural fairness or unreasonable findings rather than a rehearing on the merits. Because the $1,000 fee is not refunded, the cheaper path is almost always to build the file properly the first time.
Everything the employer states in an LMIA application becomes measurable later. The wage, the hours, the duties, the location, the benefits and any stream-specific commitments are compared against what the employer actually delivered when an inspection is opened under section 209.5. Do not describe an aspirational position; describe the one you will actually provide.
Recruitment is the part of an LMIA employers most often do badly, because it feels like a formality attached to a decision already made. It is not. The application asks the employer to demonstrate reasonable efforts to hire Canadians and permanent residents, and the file has to make that demonstrable rather than assertable. That means dated screenshots of each advertisement showing the full text and the posting period, the Job Bank posting number, a log of every applicant with the date of application, the screening outcome and a specific reason, and records of interviews conducted.
Requirements listed in the advertisement deserve particular care. Requirements that are not genuinely necessary for the position, or that are calibrated to the intended candidate rather than to the job, will be read as artificial barriers to domestic applicants. A demand for a specific foreign language where the role does not require it, an unusually long minimum experience period, or a credential that no Canadian in the occupation typically holds will each attract scrutiny. If a requirement is genuine, the employer should be able to explain why the position cannot be performed without it.
The employer also has to be visible as a real business. Officers assess whether the employer is actively engaged in the business, whether the offer is consistent with reasonable employment needs, and whether the employer is reasonably able to fulfil the terms of the offer. Business registration documents, recent financial statements, payroll remittance records, a commercial lease and evidence of existing staff all speak to that. A newly incorporated entity with no revenue seeking to bring in several workers will be assessed sceptically, and rightly so.
A positive assessment is not the end of the file. The employer is now bound by section 209.3 of the Regulations to remain actively engaged in the business, to comply with federal and provincial employment and recruitment law, to provide employment in the same occupation and with wages and working conditions substantially the same as but not less favourable than those set out in the offer, to make reasonable efforts to provide a workplace free of abuse, and to retain the supporting documents for six years beginning on the first day of employment.
Stream-specific commitments continue too. A Global Talent Stream employer must deliver on the Labour Market Benefits Plan it filed, and progress is reviewed. Low-wage stream employers may carry transportation, housing and health insurance obligations. Where an assessment was granted for a defined number of positions, hiring beyond that number is not covered by it. Each of these is measurable, and each is measured if an inspection is opened under section 209.5.
The assessment also has a limited validity period, and the worker must apply for the work permit within it. Employers should not treat a positive LMIA as a standing entitlement to be used whenever a candidate becomes available, and should not attempt to substitute a different worker into a position that was assessed on the basis of a named individual without taking advice first.
We are most useful before the advertising starts, because advertising errors cannot be corrected retroactively. A typical mandate begins with occupational classification and wage benchmarking, moves to drafting the advertisement and the recruitment protocol, then to preparing the business legitimacy package and the employment agreement so that the contract and the application say the same thing, and finally to the application and the employer interview preparation. Where the employer already has a refusal, we review the record and advise whether a corrected refiling or judicial review is the better route.
LMIA mandates are quoted as fixed fees per position, with the $1,000 government processing fee shown separately as a disbursement. To discuss a position, a stream or a refusal, contact our business immigration group.
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