Processing Time: Child Benefits and Syrian Refugees

processing time: Order this photo By Nicholas Keung Immigration reporter Mon., Aug. 1, 2016 Bedrettin El-Muhammed didn't worry about signing a $1,735 monthly lease for a three-bedroom apartment in March, even though his family of seven would be receiving an allowance of just $1,600 a month as government-assisted Syrian refugees, according to Toronto Star. That is because his five children, ages 13, 11, 9, 7 and 5, were eligible for about $2,000 a month in federal and provincial child benefits. They are shown with children, from left, Hussan, 11, Hanan, 13, Azam, 9, Rahaf, 5, and Muhammed, 7. But a chronic delay in processing time for child benefits has been a hardship for the El-Muhammeds and many other Syrian refugees without private sponsors to fill the gap. But for weeks, the El-Muhammeds have lived on the edge, counting on the food basket they pick up once a month from the ISNA mosque while running grocery bills on a credit card that has a $1,000 cap. The family from Aleppo, who moved out of the shelter at the Toronto Plaza Hotel on March 21, has spent the last of a one-time federal grant of $5,400 to cover first- and last-months' rent and other start-up costs for their new life in Canada. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.