Police Clearance Requirements Changed for Express Entry Applicants

Effective February 27th, 2018, applicants submitting a Permanent Residency application via the Express Entry system will only need to submit police clearances for “any country or territory, other than Canada, where the applicant has spent 6 months or more in a row within the last 10 years or since the age of 18.” This is a change from the previous requirements that applicants required a police clearance from any country or territory, other than Canada, where the applicant has spent 6 cumulative months within the last 10 years or since the age of 18.

All police clearances still also need to meet the following requirements:

• For the applicant’s current country of residence, the police certificate must have been issued no more than six months before the submission of the application
• For countries in which the applicant no longer resides, the police certificate must have been issued after the last time the applicant lived in that country.
• Police certificates need to be a scan of the original police certificate(s) in colour

Police clearances are required for the main applicant, their spouse and any dependent child over the age of 18 whether they are accompanying the applicant to Canada or not.