A BC PNP candidate (CLB 8, IELTS expiring November 2021) whose file could take 6-8 months to be approved asked whether their IELTS needed to remain valid all the way through the approval, or only at the point of filing.
What the thread advised:- IELTS is generally treated as locked in at the Acknowledgement of Receipt (AOR) stage of the Express Entry application — once your full application (including the provincial nomination points) is submitted and acknowledged, the language test score used at that point continues to count even if it later expires during processing.
- This means the province taking 6-8 months to approve the nomination is a separate clock from the language test's lock-in point — the test needs to be valid when you submit the full EE application after receiving the ITA, not necessarily throughout the earlier PNP nomination wait.
The practical takeaway: your language test generally needs to be valid at AOR (when your application is formally submitted and acknowledged), not throughout the entire nomination processing period — but double check current IRCC guidance, since exact lock-in rules can be updated.