To Countdown.
I have just completed the immigration process. It takes about 2 to 3 months to gather all the information you require to submit the application depending on how many joobs you have had and places you have lived in since you were 18. After I submitted the application it took only 5 weeks.
There are a lot of hidden exspenses such as medicals, police certificates and authentication of your qualifications etc. It has cost me around £1000 so far. It was cheaper for me since my family are all Canadian. You can expect to pay the same for each dependant.
They seem to have dropped the Official Job List now and it is mainly based on your educational/qualification level. Age is also important. Over 45 then forget it unless you are loaded.
There is no real need to use an agent to help you complete the immigration proceedure. It is fairly straight forward if not time consuming. Check out the immigration web sight at
www.canada.org.uk/visa-info
I found that very few companies even bothered to reply to my lettesr etc until I could confirm I had a visa.