Canada has changed how Express Entry scores work in Canada and job offers. Express Entry is the online system Canada uses to choose skilled workers for permanent residence, the right to live and work in Canada for good. Everyone in it gets a points score, the Comprehensive Ranking System (CRS) score, and the highest-scoring people are invited to apply; our CRS guide explains the whole score. This post covers the part that changed: more points for work in Canada in well-paid occupations, and job offers that no longer need a labour market impact assessment.

A new part of the score: work in Canada or a job offer

IRCC (Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, the federal immigration department) has put the points for work in Canada and the points for a job offer into one factor, which it calls Labour Market Integration. You get points for one of the two, whichever is worth more, never both (IRCC: changes to points for Canadian work experience and job offers).

Your work in Canada. Skilled work you were allowed to do in Canada in the last 10 years earns points for its length, the same points as before. Skilled means a job in TEER 0, 1, 2 or 3, where TEER is Canada's way of grading jobs by the training they need; our NOC and TEER guide shows how to find yours.

The last column applies if a spouse or common-law partner is coming to Canada with you.

If at least 12 months of that work (or 1,560 hours) was in occupations on Canada's high-wage list, explained below, you get extra points on top. The months do not need to be in a row or in one job, part-time work counts if it adds up to the same hours, and overlapping part-time jobs count up to 30 hours a week.

A job offer. An offer of a job in Canada earns points only when the job's occupation is on the high-wage list: 100 at level 1, 70 at level 2 and 50 at level 3, with or without a partner. An offer in an occupation that is not on the list earns no points.

The whole factor is capped at 150 points, or 140 if your partner is coming with you. Take a registered nurse with no partner and two years of nursing in Canada, an occupation at level 2: 53 points for the length plus 40 for the high-wage work makes 93. A nurse with no work in Canada but an offer of a nursing job would get 70 for the offer instead.

What the high-wage list is

IRCC's list of high-wage occupations names occupations by their code in the NOC, Canada's official list of jobs. An occupation is on it when the median wage of everyone in Canada doing that job (the middle wage: half earn more, half earn less) is at least 1.3 times the average median wage of Canada's whole workforce. There are three levels:

• Level 1: at least 2 times the average.
• Level 2: at least 1.5 times, but less than 2 times.
• Level 3: at least 1.3 times, but less than 1.5 times.

The level belongs to the occupation, never to you. IRCC says it "is not determined based on a person's specific job position or salary", so a well-paid job in an occupation that is not on the list earns no extra points, and a modestly paid job in a listed occupation does. IRCC works the levels out from the last three years of national wage data. If the list changes after you are invited to apply, the level in force on the day of your invitation is the one that counts.

Some examples from the list:

• 31102 General practitioners and family physicians: level 1.
• 21231 Software engineers and designers: level 2.
• 21232 Software developers and programmers: level 2.
• 31301 Registered nurses and registered psychiatric nurses: level 2.

Job offers no longer need an LMIA

A labour market impact assessment (LMIA) is a check some employers must pass to show that no worker already in Canada was available for the job; our LMIA guide explains it. Express Entry no longer asks for one:

• For the points. An offer earns its points without an LMIA, and an LMIA adds no extra points or priority.
• For two of the programs. Express Entry runs three programs, and the Federal Skilled Worker Program and the Federal Skilled Trades Program accept an offer without an LMIA too. For them the offer can be for any skilled job (TEER 0, 1, 2 or 3) that meets the program's own rules, on the high-wage list or not. So an offer outside the list can still help you qualify for a program while earning no points.

The offer must be for full-time work that continues for at least a year after you become a permanent resident. It can be the job you already have or a new one, with your current employer or a new one. When you apply for permanent residence, an officer checks that the offer is genuine: that the employer is actively in business, can meet the offer's terms and needs the job done, and follows Canada's employment and recruitment laws, and that you are qualified for the job and likely to take it up. An offer that is withdrawn no longer counts. A real employer never asks you to pay for an offer, and our post on how to spot immigration scams lists the other warning signs.

What does not change

• The points for the length of your work in Canada are the same, and only skilled work (TEER 0, 1, 2 or 3) counts.
• The combination points for your work in Canada with your education, or with your work outside Canada, still count only how long you worked, never the high-wage levels.
• Age, education, language and your partner's factors score as before, and a nomination from a province or territory is still worth 600 points.

If you are already in the pool

The pool is everyone with an Express Entry profile. When IRCC made the change, it said it would recalculate the score of every profile in the pool, which could take up to two weeks, and that it would pause invitation rounds meanwhile.

• Check that your profile gives the right NOC code for each job in Canada, since the code decides the level.
• If you hold a job offer, check that your profile includes it. IRCC's changes page explains what to enter while its online system catches up.
• More points do not guarantee an invitation: each round has its own requirements and its own cutoff, the lowest score it invites.

How our questionnaire and calculator count it

Our free questionnaire asks for each job you have held, with its official code, and whether you have a job offer in Canada; if you have one, it asks the job, the province or territory, and what kind of offer it is. Your report's CRS score then counts the points for your work in Canada, with the high-wage extra from all your jobs counted together, or the points for your offer, whichever is higher. The free CRS calculator runs the same calculation from fewer answers: your main job in Canada and how long you have done it, and any job offer. Neither creates your Express Entry profile, and neither can promise an invitation.