Remote Work from Canada Does Not Give You Foreign Work Experience — And People Are Getting Refused

IMMERGITY Immigration Consultant 2026-06-09 14 min read

I have reviewed Express Entry profiles where candidates were sitting on 50 to 75 extra CRS points from "foreign work experience" earned while physically sitting at a desk in Mississauga, Brampton, or Toronto — working remotely for an employer based abroad. Some of those candidates received an ITA. Some submitted their PR application. And some have since received refusals.

The refusals are not a surprise to me. They should not be a surprise to anyone who has read the Ministerial Instructions respecting the Express Entry system. The statute is unambiguous. The confusion was never in the law — it was in an informal email that thousands of people treated as the law.

I want to address this directly, because I keep seeing the same bad advice circulating in Facebook groups, Reddit threads, and even from some practitioners: that working remotely from Canada for a foreign employer counts as foreign work experience under Express Entry. It does not. It never did. And I am going to show you exactly where the law says so.

What Section 25(1)(a) Actually Says

The Ministerial Instructions respecting the Express Entry system govern how every CRS point is calculated and awarded. Section 25 defines foreign work experience for the purposes of skill transferability points — specifically the combinations in sections 23 and 24 that can add up to 50 points each, for a maximum of 100 skill transferability points total.

Section 25(1)(a) states, in plain language:

"Foreign work experience is work experience that is acquired by a foreign national outside Canada..."

That is the complete legal test. Outside Canada. Not "for a foreign employer." Not "in a foreign labour market." Not "while on a foreign payroll." The test is physical location — where your body was when you performed the work.

If you were physically present in Canada when you performed the work, it is not foreign work experience under the Ministerial Instructions, regardless of who signed your paycheque, regardless of what country your employer is incorporated in, and regardless of whether you were invoicing in USD, EUR, or INR.

Scenario	Physical Location	Employer Location	Counts as Foreign WE?
Working abroad for foreign employer	Outside Canada	Foreign	✅ Yes — Section 25(1)(a)
Remote work from Canada for foreign employer	Inside Canada	Foreign	❌ No — fails Section 25(1)(a)
Remote work from Canada for Canadian employer	Inside Canada	Canadian	✅ Canadian WE — Section 15(3)
Self-employed in Canada, foreign clients	Inside Canada	Foreign clients	❌ No — fails Section 25(1)(a) + s.15(7)(b)

Section 25 also requires that the work be in a TEER 0–3 occupation, full-time or equivalent, within the past 10 years, and remunerated by wages or commission. But none of those conditions even become relevant if the work was performed inside Canada — the "outside Canada" test in Section 25(1)(a) is a threshold requirement that eliminates the claim before anything else is examined.

The ImmReps Email That Started This

In late 2024, immigration lawyer Steven Meurrens published correspondence from IRCC's Immigration Representatives Mailbox (ImmReps) — an internal channel where authorized representatives submit procedural and policy questions. The response, which circulated widely in the practitioner community and then went viral on social media, stated that an applicant could claim concurrent work experience for two full-time jobs — one in Canada and one performed remotely for a foreign employer — and that the system may grant CRS skill transferability points for the foreign work experience alongside core points for the Canadian work experience.

That response was informal. It came from an administrative mailbox, not from the Minister, not from a Policy Operational Instruction, and not from an amendment to the Ministerial Instructions. It had no legal force. It did not amend Section 25(1)(a). It did not change a single word of the statute.

What it did was create the impression that IRCC had blessed a practice that the written law clearly prohibits. Thousands of candidates built or inflated their Express Entry profiles on the strength of that impression. Some of them now have PR refusals sitting in their IRCC accounts.

RCIC Burcu Akyol followed up formally with ImmReps in 2025 specifically asking IRCC to reconcile the email response with Section 25(1)(a). The response she received was, in substance, non-committal. IRCC declined to explicitly confirm or retract. That silence is not legal permission — it is an unresolved administrative inconsistency, and immigration officers are not bound by ImmReps responses when the Ministerial Instructions say otherwise.

Source	Legal Weight	What It Said
Section 25(1)(a) — Ministerial Instructions	Binding law	Foreign WE must be acquired outside Canada
ImmReps response (late 2024)	Non-binding administrative email	Suggested concurrent Canadian + foreign WE may be credited
IRCC Functional Guidance (Jan 2024)	Internal operational guidance — not binding on officers	No regulatory barrier to concurrent employment noted
Proposed 2026 reforms (consultation closed May 24, 2026)	Not yet law — under consideration	Would explicitly exclude work "remunerated by foreign sources" from Canadian WE definition

Section 25(4): The Second Layer Everyone Missed

Even if I set aside Section 25(1)(a) and assume for the sake of argument that remote work from Canada could somehow qualify as foreign work experience, there is a second statutory provision that eliminates the concurrent stacking strategy entirely.

Section 25(4) of the Ministerial Instructions — titled "Work in Excess" — states:

"For the purposes of sections 23 and 24, a period of work experience that exceeds full-time work in one occupation, or simultaneous periods of work experience in more than one full-time occupation, are to be evaluated as a single period of full-time work experience in a single occupation."

The entire premise of the concurrent experience strategy is that working a Canadian job and a foreign remote job at the same time gives you double the experience — one year of Canadian work experience and one year of foreign work experience accruing simultaneously. Section 25(4) directly collapses this. Two concurrent full-time jobs, regardless of jurisdiction, count as one period of full-time experience in one occupation.

The identical rule appears in Section 15(6) for Canadian work experience, using identical language. This is not an oversight or an ambiguity — it is a deliberate statutory design to prevent the accumulation of experience years beyond what is realistically worked in a calendar year.

When I use the CRS Simulator to model profiles where candidates have claimed concurrent Canadian and foreign experience, the point inflation from this strategy often amounts to 25 to 50 CRS points. At current draw cutoffs, that is often the difference between receiving an ITA and waiting another year. The stakes of getting this wrong are significant.

What the Proposed 2026 Reforms Confirm

In April 2026, IRCC released detailed proposals for a major Express Entry overhaul as part of its consultations on reforming the Federal High Skilled programs. Public consultations closed on May 24, 2026. Among the proposed changes is a formal redefinition of qualifying Canadian work experience that would explicitly exclude:

"Work remunerated by foreign sources or performed for a foreign government, organization, or business."

Some practitioners have interpreted this as a new restriction — IRCC "backtracking" on its earlier informal guidance. I read it differently. IRCC is not closing a loophole that previously existed. IRCC is codifying in explicit regulatory language what Section 25(1)(a) already establishes through the "outside Canada" physical location test. The proposed language makes the point unmistakable for those who missed it in Section 25(1)(a), but the substantive legal position has not changed.

The proposed reforms also retain foreign work experience as a skill transferability factor — meaning genuine foreign work experience earned while physically outside Canada continues to generate CRS points. What disappears is the manufactured version: remote work performed inside Canada being dressed up as foreign experience.

If you want to understand how your current CRS score holds up under the proposed reforms, the CRS Simulator is a practical starting point for scenario modelling. And if you are weighing provincial options given the uncertainty around federal Express Entry, the PNP Program Finder can identify streams where your profile is competitive right now, under current rules.

Refusals Are Happening — What This Means in Practice

Since early 2026, there has been a documented increase in Express Entry PR refusals where the ground is the ineligibility of claimed foreign work experience. The pattern is consistent: an applicant claims CRS skill transferability points for remote work performed from inside Canada, receives an ITA, submits their PR application, and is then refused when an officer applies Section 25(1)(a) as written and strips the points. With the adjusted score below the draw cutoff, the application fails.

The risk does not stop at refusal. Under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, submitting materially incorrect information in an immigration application — including claiming points for experience you are not entitled to — can constitute misrepresentation under section 40 of IRPA. A finding of misrepresentation carries a five-year bar on all Canadian immigration applications. This is not a theoretical risk. Officers are examining these claims carefully, and the combination of Section 25(1)(a) and an inflated CRS score creates a fact pattern that misrepresentation findings are built on.

I am not saying that every candidate who claimed remote work experience did so dishonestly. Many were following advice from the ImmReps email in good faith, relying on what appeared to be an official IRCC position. But good faith does not override the statute, and it does not prevent a refusal when the legal basis for the claimed points does not exist.

Risk Level	Situation	Consequence
High	ITA received on inflated CRS; PR application pending	Refusal if adjusted score falls below draw cutoff; possible misrepresentation finding
High	Active Express Entry profile with remote WE claimed	Profile should be corrected before ITA received — claiming ineligible points is a misrepresentation risk from profile stage
Medium	Profile relies on remote foreign WE for category-based draw eligibility	Category eligibility may be challenged; work experience as of Feb 18, 2026 must be 12 months cumulative and legitimately qualifying
Lower	Remote work performed while physically outside Canada before moving to Canada	Legitimate foreign WE — Section 25(1)(a) satisfied; document carefully

What To Do Right Now

If your Express Entry profile includes foreign work experience that was performed remotely while you were physically in Canada, take these steps immediately:

• Audit your profile against Section 25(1)(a). For every period of claimed foreign work experience, confirm where you were physically located when that work was performed. If you were in Canada, those points are not supportable under the Ministerial Instructions.
• Recalculate your actual CRS score. Remove any foreign work experience points that fail the "outside Canada" test and recalculate. Use the CRS Simulator to model your corrected score and understand where you stand against current draw cutoffs.
• Update your profile before receiving an ITA. Claiming ineligible points is a misrepresentation risk at the profile stage — not only after submission. Correcting your profile proactively is the right course of action.
• If you have already received an ITA and submitted a PR application, consult a regulated immigration consultant or lawyer before responding to any procedural fairness letter. Do not attempt to address a potential misrepresentation finding without professional guidance.
• If your Canadian work experience is legitimate, use the FSW 67-Point Calculator to confirm your FSWP grid score independently — particularly if you are relying on the FSWP and your eligibility rests on the work experience factor.
• Consider provincial pathways. Several PNP streams do not carry the same foreign work experience restrictions as the federal CRS skill transferability factors. The PNP Program Finder can identify streams where your actual, verifiable work history makes you competitive.

My Actual Take

I do not blame candidates for believing the ImmReps guidance. When a response comes from an official IRCC mailbox, it carries the appearance of authority. The problem is that appearances are not law. The Ministerial Instructions are law. Section 25(1)(a) has said "outside Canada" since Express Entry launched, and it still says "outside Canada" today.

What concerns me most is not the candidates who claimed this experience — many of them acted in good faith on advice they received. What concerns me is the practitioners who continued promoting this strategy after Section 25(1)(a) was pointed out, who dismissed the legal text in favour of an administrative email, and who did not flag the misrepresentation risk to their clients.

The proposed 2026 reforms closing this in explicit regulatory language are not a backtrack. They are IRCC acknowledging that the informal guidance created confusion and codifying the correct position in terms nobody can misread. When those reforms take effect — and I believe they will — the question of remote work and foreign work experience will be settled beyond any argument. But right now, today, the statute is already clear.

If your Express Entry strategy depends on points that Section 25(1)(a) does not support, the time to fix that is before an officer reviews your application — not after.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does remote work for a foreign employer count as foreign work experience under Express Entry?

No. Section 25(1)(a) of the Ministerial Instructions respecting the Express Entry system defines foreign work experience as work acquired by a foreign national outside Canada. Physical location is the test — not employer location. If you were physically in Canada when the work was performed, it does not qualify as foreign work experience regardless of where your employer is based.

What was the ImmReps guidance that suggested remote work could count, and why does it not override the Ministerial Instructions?

In late 2024, IRCC's Immigration Representatives Mailbox issued a response suggesting concurrent Canadian and foreign work experience could both be credited under certain conditions. ImmReps responses are administrative emails — they are not Ministerial Instructions, Policy Operational Instructions, or regulations. They do not have legal force. Immigration officers applying the Ministerial Instructions are not bound by ImmReps responses, and Section 25(1)(a) has not been amended to reflect that guidance.

What does Section 25(4) mean for candidates who claimed concurrent Canadian and foreign work experience?

Section 25(4) states that simultaneous periods of work experience in more than one full-time occupation are to be evaluated as a single period of full-time work experience in a single occupation. Even if a candidate argued their remote foreign work qualified under Section 25(1)(a), Section 25(4) collapses two concurrent full-time jobs into one period — eliminating the double-stacking of Canadian core points and foreign skill transferability points that the concurrent strategy relied on.

What happens if my Express Entry profile includes foreign work experience points that fail the Section 25(1)(a) test?

If an officer reviews your PR application and determines that claimed foreign work experience was earned while you were physically in Canada, those points will be removed. If your adjusted CRS score falls below the cutoff for the draw under which you received your ITA, your application will be refused. Depending on the circumstances, a misrepresentation finding under section 40 of IRPA is also possible, which carries a five-year bar on all Canadian immigration applications.

Can I correct my Express Entry profile if I have already claimed ineligible foreign work experience points?

Yes — and you should do so immediately if your profile is still active in the pool and you have not yet received an ITA. Updating your profile to reflect accurate, eligible work experience is the correct course of action. If you have already received an ITA and submitted a PR application, consult a regulated immigration consultant or lawyer before taking any further steps, as the appropriate response depends on the specific facts of your case.

Does genuine foreign work experience earned while physically outside Canada still count under Express Entry?

Yes, absolutely. Foreign work experience earned while you were physically present outside Canada in a TEER 0–3 occupation, within the past 10 years, and remunerated by wages or commission fully qualifies under Section 25 of the Ministerial Instructions. The proposed 2026 reforms retain foreign work experience as a skill transferability factor. The restriction applies specifically to work performed from inside Canada — not to work legitimately earned abroad before or after any period of Canadian residency.