r/uscanadaborder

Hey, so five years ago, there was an altercation at my property/place of business, where I was physically attacked and I used deadly force to defend myself. The litigation dragged on for three years until ultimately the District Attorney dismissed the case without prejudice. The person that I used deadly force on was a felon with multiple convictions, who should not have been out on the streets to begin with because of his most recent robbery, 1 month prior, at a cellphone store... Well that aside, my charges were dismissed and expunged shortly after, it's been five years since the incident, and 2 years since it was dismissed. If I have the paperwork showing that it was dismissed, will I have an issue crossing into Canada? I was charged with assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill and or inflict serious bodily injury.

First time planning to do this. My plan is to send a lot of my stuff through upack, only have in car stuff I'd want immediately once get back to lower 48 (electronics, clothing, bedding, etc). I will not have any guns, booze, drugs, pets, plants, or others besides myself

I did read proof of move such as employment, housing, etc is recommended- I will not have these available during this move. Is that more of a worry moving from lower 48 and up to canada rather than vice versa? Would pre existing plans such as airbnb scheduled, storage unit purchased, the upack deliveey location, etc work?

it will be in october- do I need to get winter tires? I know British Columbia says october 1st and onwards, I have all seasons that are M+S but not 3 peak. Is this good enough? I can also purchase otherwise.

I plan to pull about 1k in Canadian cash for the travel, do most places take VISA or AMEX though and cash is more for those that don't?

If important- itll be a ford focus im driving, so small and low to the ground. I have seen low clearance issues mentioned as concerns.

is there anything I'm missing? Thank you in advance! Im incredibly anxious about this as doing it all solo, and first time doing a move like this solo.​​​

Hey yall, tryna plan a trip to Canada, probably would cross thru Piegan. Only problem is I have two active warrants in the US, both are for failure to appear and only state level misdemeanor warrants, and neither are for the state I would be crossing from/into. Will I have any trouble at the border?

Hi Reddit -- I think I have a good sense of what I need to do, but haven't seen my specific scenario addressed yet. In October, I have an early morning, 0630, flight from YYZ to SFO. I am a US citizen, and only US, and have Global Entry. Realistically, how early should I be arriving at the airport? I've resigned myself to an absurdly early morning, but don't want to overdo it since I'll be landing at 0900 Pacific Time, and have a full weekend of activities for my friends' wedding. Thanks!

I am a US citizen married to a Canadian who lives in Ontario. I recently drove my car through the Detroit crossing - this was around June 4th- and was given a stamp on my passport to exit Canada by Aug 31 as I told them our intention was to figure out the PR application for me to move there. I am in the process of doing my PR application, just waiting on my FBI background check to submit it, so should be in the next week. Applying for inland and will also apply for visitor record when needed.

I had a work trip to the UK and left Canada June 14-20th and re-entered via air at YYZ but was not given a new stamp in my passport.
I’m trying to understand if the Aug 31st date is still valid or did my re-entry count as a “new visa” allowing a 6-month stay?

Invited my son’s girlfriend to go to canada with us but she is 15yo. her mother knows about their relationship but her father doesn’t and it’s a huge conflict if he does find out. I know that she needs a birth certificate as well as a parental letter of consent but the letter needs both parents signatures as they are married. idk what to do if her father doesn’t know about the relationship and even if it was okay for the mom just to sign off there is the risk of both parents being called. i don’t know what to do and i also need to know the risks of the parents being called though her mother fully agrees to the trip and i really want her to come with us.

On Saturday, (1pm)my 2 children (14 and 17) and myself went to Vermont, from Quebec. We crossed at Stanstead, it was a 90 minute wait. My son (14) was travelling with a birth certificate and expired passport (I always bring his passport as extra proof)

My 17 year old had his adult passport
Myself - British passport

I needed to renew my I-94 visa, so we went to secondary, the usual procedure - everyone out the car - paid and left

Coming back home, we went to New York and crossed at Lacolle (Sunday 6pm) - the guy asked me How my 17 year old left ? I asked him - what do you mean? We all left together
He said there is no record of my kid leaving Canada
I told him we all left at the same time, they both came with me to secondary inspection

He tapped on his computer some more shrugged and let us back in

I just wondered why it didn’t show he had left ?

I’d like to hear about experiences of anyone else that has signed an Allowed to Leave and then attempted to try to go back to Canada again.

The reason doesn’t matter, I’d just like to hear about the experience please.

I have a flight to the US from Pearson tomorrow. My citizenship on Nexus is currently GBR but I want to update it to Canadian as I got my passport last year.

Can I do this pre-flight? My understanding is, go to CBSA early and do that part in Pearson. Then go to regular US customs (not Nexus) and ask them to update it there when I speak to the officer?

Thanks!

Background info: My gf, soon to be fiance & I live in border towns. I’m Canadian & she’s American, for the most part I travel over there every weekend for the last year or so with her visiting once in a while.

I’ve never had any issues at the border, never been pulled into secondary and never been questioned more than what my plans are and how do I know my SO. I declare every single item I bring back and have even paid customs when required.

This weekend as I cross back into Canada I get told to turn off my truck at the booth and asked what I have in my vehicle to declare. Pretty routine stuff and no problems at this point and I inform the officer I have left over homemade food from the gf & 2 personal vapes I purchased. He opens my trunk and asks whats there and thats when I inform him I have tennis rackets, beach chairs, a football, etc AND a car spoiler. This is the issue.

The officer questions the spoiler. I understand how it looks on his part that I might be attempting to avoid declaring it. I inform him that the part is actually Canadian and I’ve had it in my trunk for the last month and even been questioned by the Americans and when I tell them its for personal use I just haven’t gotten to it yet they’re pretty understanding and let me continue on my way.

My issue is that even after explaining to the officer that the part is originally Canadian and I’ve had it for about a month he goes on to say “its ironic and honestly it looks like you’re smuggling it”. This is what tripped me out since I didn’t have a receipt on me to verify I purchased it in Canada. I told the officer that the part is actually from a friends dealership/mechanic shop and offered I call him which the officer agrees to. The officer asks him to confirm the story and if he can produce a receipt to which my friend says yes but its 11pm on a Friday night and will need to wait until tomorrow.

Officer tells me to hang up and then goes on an absolute rant & lecture about me “playing these games” and that my career means I’m a professional and I should not be doing favours for friends like this because it’ll ruin my life not theres. The officer then says “I’m going to put this into the computer and let me tell you, the Americans are not as kind as us. They will search your car and flag you for years and possibly even tear your car apart. Do you want that?? What if they deny you entry to the US? What are you gonna tell your little sweet heart then? That you cant visit or apply for a green card anymore cause you did a favour for a friend?” Literally word for word lol, he then told me I’m good to go.

What confuses me is that he said he will put it in the system but then numerous times said he is doing me a courtesy and giving me advice he hopes I take. Now I’m absolutely confused, what did he put into the computer if anything? This car part is legit from Canada and now I’m sick to my stomach with the fact I might have issues with crossing as we will be applying for a green card soon, I’ll be flying out of that city in September to where both our parents live so we can get engaged.

Any advice? I’ll be crossing next weekend and will have the paper invoice on me in case of any questions and already moved the part out of my vehicle. I have new shoes in my back seat that are worth double what the part ($100 lol) is and the Americans never question any of my belongings but I know better now for the future. Thank you!

Hey everyone, my fiance and I will driving to Washington state in September for a hairdressing class her work is paying for.

She will not be working, just receiving instruction and learning. This course is split between 5 classes, spread out every 3-4 weeks from September to December.

I am wondering if we need any paperwork or forms done for this. We will also be spending a couple extra days each visit to just explore Washington and probably head down the coast.

Thank you all! :)

Hello all,

I am a remote-work software developer in the US who has worked with a Canadian company for the last two years, formally as an employee of its US incorporation in Delaware. I work on a team with other Canadian developers, but I’m employed under the US incorporation, so we aren’t compensated by the same entity.

I have been traveling across the border for various little team building activities and in person meetings every few months. To be honest, I marked myself as going for ‘personal’ or ‘work’ on different occasions, as I’d been made to understand that business visitor travel lived in a gray area that I didn’t understand well. However, at customs last February, I told them I was traveling for work and had to withdraw my application. My boss corrected me, told me I’m going as a business visitor, and sent me back again - I got grilled by customs and had to withdraw again after the presiding border agent didn’t trust my documentation. It’s worth noting that these trips didn’t usually have full agendas planned, and the empty spaces in my schedule were part of the reason for denial.

After this I spoke with my HR team about getting a work visa, but they pushed back after speaking with an attorney and asked me to travel as a business visitor. I’m slated to travel this week again, with a full schedule of meetings with Canadian company employees and paystubs/invitation letters but no work visa. As I understand it there’s gray area here, and I know I will be pulled into secondary with a flagged passport - is this legally sound or should I push back and avoid this business trip?

I have had my white-front Amazon for 10 years. I am hoping to attend Queen's in September 2027 and would feel guilty leaving him with my mom. What is the process for importing my pet parrot? Any tips or personal experiences to share?

I am in a car of five people and I just had the border agent take a picture of just me. I normally wouldn't care but I am transgender and I am worried about ICE's current power trip. Has anyone else experienced this? My passport has the wrong gender, so it's probable that they could have just been confused by that.

I highly doubt it's anything bad but it's stuck in my head in a bad way.

20+ years ago in the US, I received 3 misdemeanors, 1 of which is considered a felony in Canada.

Back in 2008, I tried to go to Canada, but was turned down at the border and was told that I would need to go through a process (rehabilitation?) to be admitted to Canada, and the process would require jumping through a ton of hoops (getting fingerprinted at a local police station to subpoena my criminal records from another state, etc..), so I just never did it and never tried going back to Canada.

So it's now been over 20 years since the last offense, and it would be nice to finally visit Canada, but I do not know if I still need to go through all these hoops and apply for a permit/rehabilitation/etc..., or if enough time has elapsed where I would be able to drive through the border?

Does anyone know what I need to do to finally visit Canada? I heard that once you were flagged (like I was back in 2008), you're flagged forever, but that if 10+ years have passed then you can be deemed rehabilitated.

If anyone has guidance on my situation, or knows of a way that I can get total clarity on how to proceed, it's much appreciated. I really don't want to gamble on another attempt of driving through the border.

I’m Canadian and so is my dog. I plan to make a detour through Maine for 48 hours on my way home from the east coast. I’ve filled out the CDC form for her but do not have her rabies paperwork from last year and cannot obtain them.

I hear a lot of people saying the border guards don’t care, and as I may enjoy the privilege of being white and moderately well-to-do on a nice family vacation with the dog, I’m wondering what my odds are here or if I should abandon this plan.

And what’s the absolute worst case scenario here for me and the dog?

My girlfriend and I were planning on going on a one day trip with our friends from New York to Toronto soon, but she will not be able to get her passport in time. Would a standard driver’s license (not REAL ID or Enhanced License) combined with original birth certificate and social security card be enough to get us over the border into Canada and back to the US without issue?

My friend drove all the way from Florida to Orville border to come and visit me in Canada and got denied that he’s a terrorist? Has this happened to anyone? what can we do to get him in - he has done nothing wrong. Worst feeling ever.