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Transferring Employees to Canada

Doing business globally often means moving employees from place to place. If your company has overseas employees who need to work in Canada temporarily or even long-term then its important to ensure they have the necessary authorization to work.

Business Visitors

At the simplest level is what is commonly termed a "Business Visitor". For example someone travelling to Canada for meetings, for training or to work on a short term project but where they are still paid and employed by the overseas parent/subsidiary company and are not entering the Canadian Labour market as such. Business Visitors do not normally need to obtain work permits or any HRSDC confirmations. If you are not sure whether your foreign personnel would qualify as Business Visitors we would be happy to discuss the rules with you in more detail.

Inter-Company Transferees

If you need to move employees from overseas divisions of the company to Canada temporarily and actually employ them in Canada (i.e. they would work for the Canadian company and be paid in Canada) then they will typically be classed as an Inter-Company Transferee. They will need a Temporary Work Permit but not usually the HRSDC Confirmation. This simplifies the process considerably.

Inter-Company Transferees must usually be Executives or Senior Managers or have specialized knowledge of the company’s products or operations. There must also be a "qualifying relationship" between the overseas company and the Canadian company, meaning that it must be a true subsidiary, parent or division of the same company. If the employee is new to the company they will normally need to have worked for the overseas company for at least a year before they can be transferred as an Inter-Company Transferee.

Permanent Transfers

If the transfer of an employee to Canada is a permanent relocation or likely to be long-term (beyond 2 years) then it usually makes sense to assist the employee to gain Permanent Residency in Canada, allowing them to stay indefinitely. A number of immigration programs may be suitable for this purpose including Provincial Nominee Programs and the federal Skilled Worker program.