After a refusal · Federal Court
The Court reviews the decision. It does not make a new one.
Judicial review asks whether an IRCC officer decided your case reasonably and fairly. If it succeeds, your file usually goes back to be decided again by a different officer — it does not produce a visa. It requires a lawyer, and the deadline is short and already running.
The remedy, plainly
What judicial review actually is
Most immigration refusals carry no appeal. There is no tribunal that rehears a refused visitor visa or study permit and substitutes its own answer. What exists instead is supervision by the courts: the Federal Court of Canada can examine whether the officer’s decision was reasonable and whether the process leading to it was procedurally fair.
That distinction governs everything else on this page. The judge is not deciding whether you should be admitted to Canada. The judge is deciding whether the decision that was made can stand — whether the reasoning is coherent and justified on the record, whether central evidence was ignored, whether a concern that you had no chance to answer was held against you.
So a strong case for judicial review is not the same thing as a sympathetic case. Files that are genuinely deserving but were simply weakly documented usually do not have a reviewable error in them. Files that were refused on reasoning that does not survive reading sometimes do, regardless of how the applicant comes across.
Four things to be clear about
What the Federal Court will and will not do
These are the points most often misunderstood before people reach counsel — and misunderstanding them is what makes this route feel like a disappointment even when it succeeds.
What is reviewed
The decision, not your case
What the Court sees
The record that existed then
What success looks like
Sent back, not granted
What it is not
Not an appeal on the merits
Winning means being sent back, not being approved
This is the single most important sentence on the page. When an application for judicial review is allowed, the refusal is quashed and the matter is remitted to IRCC for a fresh decision, normally by a different officer. Your application is alive again. It has not been granted.
The new officer decides on the record as it stands, and can refuse again — sometimes on the same broad ground, better reasoned. People who go into this expecting a court to hand them a visa come out of a technical success feeling cheated. Go in understanding what the remedy is.
The first gate
Leave: permission to be heard at all
Immigration matters do not proceed straight to a hearing. The Act requires you to apply for the Court’s leave — its permission — before the case can be argued. A judge reads the written material and decides whether the application is arguable enough to go forward.
Leave is decided on paper. Nobody appears, no one gives oral evidence, and reasons are not normally provided. If leave is refused, the matter ends and the Act gives no appeal from that determination.
This is why the written work matters so much. The leave stage is often the whole case, and it is won or lost on a record and a memorandum drafted by counsel — not on how compelling your circumstances are in conversation.
The second gate
Time, and why it is already running
The Act sets a filing period for the application for leave, and it is short. Two different periods exist: one for matters arising inside Canada and one for matters arising outside Canada. We do not print either period here, and we will not tell you which applies to your decision — that is a legal question, and getting it wrong ends the remedy. Counsel answers it.
The period runs from the day you are notified of the decision, or otherwise become aware of it. Not from when you understood what it meant, not from when you obtained the officer’s notes, and not from when you finished deciding what to do. It is running now.
A judge may allow an extended time for special reasons. That is a discretionary application counsel has to argue and win, and delay caused by shopping around for advice is not a strong reason. Treat the deadline as real.
Because both periods are statutory and unforgiving, read them at the source rather than from any website, this one included.
The sequence
How a judicial review runs
Each stage is a filter. Most applications do not reach the last one.
- 1
Counsel assesses whether there is a reviewable error
A lawyer reads the refusal, the officer’s notes and the file as it was filed, and forms a view on whether the decision contains an error a court could act on. Many refusals, honestly read, do not.
- 2
The application for leave is filed in time
Judicial review is commenced by an application for leave to the Federal Court. The statutory period is short and begins running from when you are notified of, or otherwise become aware of, the decision — not from when you decide to act.
- 3
The record and written argument are perfected
Counsel requests the decision-maker’s reasons and record, then files affidavit evidence and a written memorandum setting out the alleged errors. The Minister files a response.
- 4
A judge decides leave, on paper
Leave is decided in writing, without anyone appearing. If leave is refused, the matter ends there — and the Act provides no appeal from that decision.
- 5
If leave is granted, the hearing
A hearing date is set and counsel argues the case before a judge of the Federal Court.
- 6
The judgment, then redetermination
If the application is allowed, the decision is quashed and the matter goes back to IRCC to be decided again, usually by a different officer, sometimes with directions from the Court. That new decision can still be a refusal.
What commonly goes wrong
The failure patterns we see
The deadline is spent deciding. The most common way this route is lost is not in court. It is weeks of consulting friends, ordering the officer’s notes, and waiting for a clearer picture — while a statutory period that was never long expires quietly.
Treating it as a second application. People assemble the bank statements and employment letters they wish they had filed and expect the Court to look at them. Judicial review is generally argued on the record that was before the officer. New evidence belongs in a new application, not here.
Confusing disagreement with error. “The officer was wrong about me” is not a ground. The reasoning has to be shown to be unreasonable or the process unfair. That is a legal assessment, and it is why the first step is having a lawyer read the file, not deciding to sue.
Being taken to court by someone who cannot go there. Agents and consultants sometimes take money to “file in Federal Court”. They cannot conduct that litigation. What follows is either nothing filed, or something filed badly, in a proceeding where a missed step cannot be undone.
Winning and being refused again. A redetermination is a genuine second decision, not a formality. Where the underlying file was thin, the second officer often reaches the same destination by a better route. If the weakness was evidentiary rather than legal, litigation was never the fix.
Being honest about fit
Who this route does not suit
For most refusals, this is not the answer
It does not suit you if your file was simply under-documented. If the honest diagnosis is that the officer had too little to work with, the remedy is a better application, not a court challenge — and a court challenge will not let you supply what was missing.
It does not suit you if what you want is speed. This route adds a legal proceeding in front of your immigration matter, and even complete success returns you to the start of an IRCC decision rather than to an approval.
It does not suit you if a simpler step has not been tried and is still open. For some refusals a request for reconsideration or a properly rebuilt fresh application is the proportionate response. Start by finding out what the refusal actually said — the officer’s notes usually say more than the letter.
And it does not suit anyone who wants a promised result. Two separate judicial decisions and then a fresh officer’s decision sit between you and any outcome, and none of them belongs to your representative. That is why we publish a no-guarantee policy.
Who can act for you
This is a lawyer’s work, and we are not pretending otherwise
An application for leave and judicial review is litigation in the Federal Court of Canada. In that court you may act in person or be represented by a lawyer in good standing with a law society in Canada. The Federal Court states plainly, in its own guidance on who may represent you, that a citizenship or immigration consultant may neither represent you in a Federal Court proceeding nor give you legal advice about it. That includes us. Anyone who says otherwise is either misdescribing what they will do or misleading you outright.
What we can honestly do is the part that comes first, and it is not a small part: read the refusal and the officer’s notes and tell you what was actually decided and on what basis, so that your file is intelligible when it reaches a lawyer. Whether there is a reviewable error, which filing period applies, and what should be filed are questions for Canadian counsel — not for us, and nothing on this page is legal advice about your proceeding. Where the refusal reads like a documentation problem rather than a decision-making one, we will say so plainly and put our effort into a better application instead.
If you are already close to your deadline, contact a Canadian immigration lawyer now and do the diagnosis in parallel. The one thing that cannot be recovered is the time.
Where the current rules live
Read the deadlines at the source
The leave requirement, the filing periods and the power to extend time are set out in section 72 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. The procedure itself is governed by the Federal Courts Citizenship, Immigration and Refugee Protection Rules, and the Court publishes its own guidance, forms and fees at the Federal Court of Canada. The right of appeal from a judgment on judicial review — available only where the judge certifies a serious question of general importance — is in section 74 of the same Act.
On who may act for you, the Federal Court publishes its own statement of who may represent you in an immigration, refugee protection or citizenship matter. If you take one link from this page, take that one.
We deliberately do not print court fees, cost estimates or the day counts here. The periods are short enough that a stale or mis-transcribed number on a website could cost you the remedy entirely — read them at the source, on the day, and confirm with counsel which one applies to your decision.
Straight answers
The questions people actually ask
If I win, do I get the visa?
What is “leave” and why does it exist?
How long do I have to file?
Can an immigration consultant file this for me?
Should I wait for the officer’s notes before deciding?
What does it cost?
Is reapplying a better option?
Can I appeal if the Federal Court dismisses my case?
Before the deadline runs
Find out whether this is a decision problem or an evidence problem
Send us the refusal letter, the date you were notified, and anything else IRCC sent you. We will tell you honestly whether this looks like something for Canadian counsel — or whether a better application is the real answer.