When acquaintances find out that I’m a Calgary immigration lawyer, they often ask a variation on the following question: I understand why someone being deported would hire an immigration lawyer, but why would the average person hire a lawyer just to do an immigration application? Unfortunately, this way of thinking often leads to problems. As in many areas in which having legal counsel is advisable, if you consult with an immigration lawyer only after something has gone wrong, it’s quite possibly already too late to change the outcome at that point. If you obtain the services of an immigration lawyer only after an application is rejected, for instance, you are faced with the prospect of either starting your application from scratch (if that is even still possible) or appealing the adverse decision (if that is even still possible). Either way, you have likely wasted both time and money and would have been much better off retaining a lawyer from the outset.