Think of Dr. Joe Greenholtz as the living embodiment of a roadmap that concisely gets you from point A to Z along the often complex route toward Canadian citizenship.
A regulated Canadian immigration consultant, Greenholtz is the founder of Dr. Joe's Immigration Consulting Services, a vital lifeline for those coming to Canada temporarily or full-time.
Greenholtz represents clients through the maze of bureaucracy and questions, filing applications on their behalf and answering client queries, government questions or requests for extra documentation.
And his resume speaks for itself: Greenholtz has served as vice chair of the Immigration Consultants of Canada Regulatory Council (ICCRC) Board of Directors and as chair of ICCRC's governance and nomination committee.
Perhaps his biggest ace in the hole? Years of experience working as a Canadian visa officer with postings in New York, New Delhi and Tokyo.
“The real value that I add is that I understand how visa officers think and what factors are important to them in making a decision to approve or refuse an application,” Greenholtz explains.
The lion’s share of Greenholtz’s clients in Sea to Sky country are from Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, the U.K., and other parts of Europe. Typically, they’re temporary workers navigating the federal points system to attain permanent resident status.
What differentiates Greenholtz’s service is not just his breadth of knowledge and experience, but also his price points and concise consulting sessions. Where his competitors can charge five times more than he does along a series of consultations, Greenholtz gets down to business from word one.
“Clients, and even everyday folks, have a very foggy idea of how the immigration process works,” he reveals. “A lot of their information comes from friends who are in similar situations, but in immigration, the details are paramount. The purpose of every consultation is to find out what you want to accomplish and how we get there. And I only charge $50.”
Greenholtz’s detail-focused, straight-to-the-point approach removes the confusion from what can be a convoluted process.
For example, listing a birthday, even one day off, could make the difference between receiving approval or not. Some don’t even know their application for permanent residency could be approved had someone given them a comprehensive review.
There are other important details that Greenholtz knows well. He recalls working with a client who wasn’t a permanent resident of Canada and didn’t know that business ownership didn’t count towards requisite work hours for his application.
However, Greenholtz was able to separate out the hours that the business owner was working onsite in his trade from the hours he spent actually managing the business, which permitted him to double dip on his work and benefit from both halves.
“What a client wants to accomplish may be counterproductive, and it may be a dead end,” Greenholtz explains. “So you have to get a comprehensive overview of what that person wants to achieve in Canada and work backwards from that.”
To book a consultation, or to learn more about how Greenholtz can help you on your path to temporary or permanent residency, visit whistler.drjoes.ca.
