Accountancy Forum

Hi Tahir,

I agree with MRS and have the same answer.

Thanks

Hi sir Toronto,
please i want to know how much can earn a new qualified CGA in toronto?

Dear alexisnar6

Please see salary details at following link;

www.cga-ontario.org/assets/file/salarysurvey_student08.pdf

Regards

Thank you dear Toronto,
i read the survey

Dear Maqszaman

I have read you valuable posts relating to working and living in Cananda.

I am currenlty based in London and in the final year of my ACA training. I applied for canadain immigration and i hope the process will be completed in line with my training.

My query is about living expenses you qouted in this thread. Are they bare minimum or average. And whether if it is in a sharing accomodation or otherwise.

My second question is that whether someone like me able to meet them in the start having a temporary job of whatever nature.

And as you mentioned i understand all the difficulties faced for an immigrant in a new country as i have been experiencing the same in UK. But if the system of the country is fair these things are of a temporary nature.

I would appreciate you thoughts on this.

Regards

Dear Rashid,

The living expenses are on average basis for a family with two kids. If you are alone you can share living expenses. There are hundreds of individuals who look for people to share their apartments. Your expenses should not be more than $1,000.00 if you are individual and want to live in shared apartment.
Secondly, you are about to be a Chartered Accountant from England which is a great advantage to you. I hope that you will get membership in Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants easily. This will ensure your bright future here (Inshallah). You will be able to get a job sooner than thousands of immigrants and will also be able to meet your living expenses much easily. The real problem is with immigrants from countries like Pakistan. No matter what we claim about our education and experience from Pakistan, but reality is that no one in the modern world gives recognitions to us. We have to travel a long journey to re-establish in countries like Canada. However, if you are talented and have or acquire required skills, you will progress rapidly. There is no discrimination in Canada as we have to face in Pakistan that some one must be sunni, shia, shindhi, punjabi, memon, and sometime it goes even deeper and one must be kuchhi, bantua, dhuraji, chanuti etc. There is no bull**** like that here.

Thanks for your propmpt reply Maqsood bhai. This thread has cleared most of my confusions and queries.

Dear maqszaman

I have returned after landing in Canada last month, now i am planning to enroll with CIMA and appear in the CPGA exam in May 2010. The idea is to claim membership of CMA Canada after completing CIMA, as you know that there is MRA between CIMA and CMA Canada. But i have some doubt as i am now a landed immigrant of Canada (although not living in Canada at this time) will this be a workable route. I am saying this because some one told me that to get CMA Canada membership one need to have enrolled with CIMA before becoming Canadian resident. Can you advice on this matter.

M.Rizwan

Hi Rizwan,

As far as I know there is no such requirement for CMA Canada membership. I know people who were in between of their CIMA program when they migrated to Canada and then completed it. After completion they got the CMA Canada membership. Landing requirement is only for CPAs and some other approved designated Accountants, coming to Canada and want to get membership in CA Canada. You have to be a designated accountant from those institutions, before landing in Canada, to be eligible to get membership in CICA. I am not aware of the latest developments. I don't see anything like that on the website of CMA Ontario as I can on CICA website. I would advise you to write to CMA Onatrio for further verification.

Dears

I have best regards for both of you. So, I hope none of you would feel any offence here.

Dear Zaman sahib, Rizwan has raised an important point to consider. I would fully agree with you that there is no such requirement/ condition on CMA (Canada) website and Rizwan should specifically ask this question from CMA (Ontario) to make sure.

Some times, not all the details are available on websites. For exmaple, CMA (ON) provides exemption from enterence exam to ICMA(P) members, and there is no requirement of one year job experience in Canada to avail this exemption arrangement. However, if someone asks for exemption on basis of ICMA(P), then they require 1 year experience in Canada and confirmation letter (with certain details) from Canadian employer.

Somehow, I have CMA(ON)'s email in which they have mentioned this requirement for ICMA(P) members. Perhaps, Rizwan would also know about it.

There is another point to consider. For CPA/CICA reciprocity arrangement, the requirement is "being resident outside Canada for reasonable time" while taking at-least one CPA exam section. So, no matter a citizen or permanent resident (which Rizwan is in this case), if appears for CPA exam while living outside Canada, may later apply for CICA reciprocity, provided satisfaction of other requirements. So, my understanding is, even now if Rizwan enrolls with CIMA while being in Pakistan and appears for some CIMA exams in Pakistan, CMA(ON) should not have any problem. Still, in my view, its better to check requirements through email with CMA(ON).

So, end of story, as Zaman sahib said Rizwan should ask CMA(ON) directly before using this option.

I hope it helps.

Regards

Thank you Mr.Maqsood and Toronto boy

The reason i raised this question is that , i was in toronto last month and had contacted CMA Canada for enrollment in SLP but they refused on the ground that i should have atleast one year canadian experience for enrolling in SLP now this information was not available on the website so i was bit surprised. Due to this reason i was asking for some first hand information.
Thank you once again for replying to my post.

Hi Toronto Boy,

Thanks for explaining the situation. You really add the points that I missed. However, I want to correct only one point here that you have to be a qualified CPA to get your membership in CICA. I am copy pasting the portion of the e-mail that I received from CICA Ontario

"Please note in order to be eligible to apply you must have successfully written all parts of the final examination of the Uniform CPA Examination while a bona fide resident of a country other than Canada for a continuous period of at least three years, and that your state board must recognize membership in the ICAO as a basis for obtaining the certificate granted by it without requiring that the Uniform CPA Examination be written".

I am sure that you won't mind this correction.

Thanks

Dear Zaman Sahib

You are quite right. CPA reciprocity arrangement is for fully qualified and licenced CPAs. However, there is some difference between "living outside Canada for 3 consecutive years before writing CPA exam section(s)" and "writing at-least one exam section" during that 3 years period. As far as my understanding is, these are 2 different requirements/ conditions i.e. that person must have lived 3 years outside Canada while he wrote at-least one exam section. Thus he may write other 3 while being in Canada, after living 3 years outside and writing one exam. For reference, I would like to provide following link. On page 2 "Residency Requirement - Committee Discretion" elaborates such provision.

http//www.icao.on.ca/Forms/1008page2572.pdf

The information provided on CICA's website says that the person should have written <b>all four </b> sections while living outside Canada for 3 years, but still review committee has discretion to reduce the requirement upto writing <b>at-least one </b> exam section. Thats what I understand from the above link.

Any how, thanks for bringing-up this point.

Best Regards

Hi Toronto Boy,

First and foremost, I am thankful to you for explaining the situation. I was not aware of this aspect of CA requirement. Since I have been living in Toronto, Canada for long time so CA was not a better option for me when I did my CPA. I do appreciate your contributions, which are really of benefit to the readers. I am really impressed with your knoweldge, analysis and writing skills. Could you please let us know your real name if you want so?

Thanks

Dear Zaman Sahib

Thanks for the words of appreciation. I too, am a qualified and licensed CPA living in Toronto for a long time. That is the reason I read your posts with much interest and wanna say you are doing a great job by explaining CPA procedures to interested people/ our country fellows, specially these are in benefit of new immigrants to Canada. Keep up the good work.

My intention is simply to payback and share my experience with interested people/ immigrants from Pakistan so they can have a second opinion while making vital career related decisions specially with reference to Canada.

I hope you would not mind to allow me retaining this privilege of anonymity on this public forum. Once you mentioned that you are in East York. I too miss my days walking at Danforth Ave, enjoying annual Greek festival and regularly taking bus from Pape station. I live in North York these days.

Best Wishes