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Deferred your intake? What members say about expiring medicals and IELTS before you enter Canada

Canada • Study Permit • study 0 views
By VisaBuddies Communityvia community — compiled from public visa forums

Documents Needed

  • Immigration medical exam (IME)

    Valid for one year — you must enter Canada while it is valid, or redo it.

  • Language test used for admission

    The university's admission stands on whatever test it accepted, regardless of that test's later expiry.

Step-by-Step

A student got a visa for one intake but the university deferred them to a later one, leaving their IELTS and medical set to expire before travel. Members separated the three worries:

  1. Medical is the hard constraint. The immigration medical is valid for one year, and you must enter Canada within that window. If your deferral pushes travel past the expiry, go for a re-medical after the old one lapses.

  2. Your admission doesn't expire with the test. One member explained that the university admitted you based on the test you submitted (here, Duolingo) irrespective of its expiry date — once admission is granted, it holds.

  3. IELTS expiry after visa issuance is generally not a border problem. A member's view: your IELTS was valid at the time of the visa decision, so there shouldn't be an issue at the airport or port of entry.

  4. One caution: the same member felt that presenting different language tests to the visa office and the university is not a great idea in general — keep your file consistent where you can.

Dos, Don'ts & Tips

  • Do: Redo your immigration medical if it will expire before you enter Canada — entry must happen within the medical's one-year validity.
  • Tip: Admission granted on a language test survives that test's expiry; the test only needed to be valid when the university and visa office assessed it.
  • Don't: Avoid submitting different language tests to the university and the visa office if you can help it — mismatches invite questions.

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