A member received a Letter of Acceptance from Conestoga College for a September 2022 intake, but the specific course wasn't offered for the January intake they'd hoped to defer to, and asked whether to just start the visa process for September now.
What the thread recommended:- If your course isn't available at a later intake, start processing your visa application immediately — you don't have the flexibility to wait, since deferring isn't actually an option for this specific course.
- Non-SDS was reported as processing faster than SDS at the time of this thread, which some members considered given the time pressure.
- However, non-SDS also came with a higher refusal rate compared to SDS, according to other members — so the speed advantage of non-SDS needs to be weighed against a lower overall approval likelihood.
- Despite the higher refusal rate concern, several members reported many people were still getting approvals through non-SDS, suggesting it remained a viable option rather than a route to avoid outright.
The practical takeaway: if your course isn't available at a later intake, don't wait — start your visa process immediately, and weigh non-SDS's faster processing against its comparatively higher refusal rate before deciding which stream to apply through.