Can I Keep Working While My Work Permit Extension Is Processing?

If you apply to renew or change the conditions of your work permit before it expires, you can legally stay in Canada until IRCC makes a decision. If the permit runs out while the application is in process, you have maintained status and authorization to work without a permit, as long as you stay in Canada.

The conditions do not change. On an employer-specific permit that means the same employer, the same job and the same work location. Open work permit holders can usually change employer, job or location unless the permit lists a specific condition.

Maintained status still applies, but you keep working for the employer named on the old permit. You cannot start with the new employer, or in the new job, until the application is approved or IRCC has emailed you an authorization to work while it processes. That authorization is a separate request through the IRCC web form; the change-of-employer guide has the steps.

Applied online: IRCC sends a letter to your account, labelled WP-EXT except PGWP, confirming you can keep working under the original conditions. The letter shows an expiry date 365 days after IRCC received the application, to satisfy employers and insurers. If the decision takes longer than that, you can still work, and IRCC points employers to its own web page as proof. You do not get this letter if you applied after the permit expired or if this is your first work permit in Canada.

Applied on paper: no letter. You show a copy of the application, proof of payment and the courier tracking record.

Renew a provincial driver's licence or health card, in most cases. Your SIN expires on the same date as the permit; you can keep working with the expired SIN, but you can only update it once the new permit arrives. If you applied without a labour market impact assessment or Quebec certificate, you have 90 days from filing to submit it, or the application can be refused as incomplete. Renew what you can before the permit date.

Applying for something other than a work permit. If you applied for a study permit or a visitor record instead, you can work only until the permit expires, not while you wait. Temporary resident permit applicants do not get maintained status at all.

Leaving Canada also changes things. You can travel. But if the application is still pending when you return, you may be let in as a visitor, and you cannot work until the extension is approved. The exception is a worker who qualifies to apply for a new permit at the border. If it was approved while you were away, you can work as soon as you enter.

IRCC's words: you should have stopped working. You may be able to restore your status as a worker within 90 days of losing it, with a new work permit application, a restoration fee of $246.25 and the $155 permit fee. The same 90-day rules apply as for students who lost status, including no work until it is granted.

IRCC posts a note in your online account. You can start working under the new conditions the moment that note appears; you do not wait for the card in the mail.

The filing date against the expiry date, whether the job you are doing today matches the permit word for word, and whether a PGWP is about to end without a bridging or LMIA-based plan behind it. In our experience, most maintained-status problems are a promotion or a transfer that nobody reported.