Anybody doing daily commute to USA from Canada on H4 EAD

[Dr kbknaidu]

Anybody in this group doing daily commute to USA from Canada on H4 EAD, if so please reply , I need some important info

 

[RajGill]

Hi - I did it not daily but quiet often. You can ask your query to me

 

[lampbreaker]

Daily commute on H4 EAD is not allowed. H4 itself is void once you move outside of US

Where do people get this information? No such thing. You will be fine with commuting, but CBP officers are not always well informed and sometimes they will send you to secondary inspection.
Of course every time you enter the US using H4 Visa, the H1B spouse must be already in the US or traveling with you.

 

[lampbreaker]

Good luck with that.
I was denied entry on H4 since we now live in Canada. If you still want to go ahead and do it, you can but very soon your entry will be denied and you will be asked to get B1/B2

You must have answered something wrong. Does your spouse live and work in the US in H1B status?

 

[harirajmohan]

You must have answered something wrong. Does your spouse live and work in the US in H1B status?

It doesnt matter as rules still dont specify this much clarity depth for making cbp to avoid denial. Many rules are still vague and left up to the interpretation to the officer who upholds the law. Same like how one judge blocks it and another judge allows the same subpoenas.

 

[lampbreaker]

It doesnt matter as rules still dont specify this much clarity depth for making cbp to avoid denial. Many rules are still vague and left up to the interpretation to the officer who upholds the law. Same like how one judge blocks it and another judge allows the same subpoenas.

That is unfortunately true.

 

[lampbreaker]

We (myself and spouse) live in Canada. Spouse is on H1 and i was on H4.
I was denied entry and asked to get B1/B2, got B1/B2 and no issues there after

Was the H1B spouse in the US already or traveling with you when you were denied entry? It will be informational to see what questions you were asked and how you answered them. Again, as above some of these things are highly discretionary and left to the CBP officer. But normally, they will at least send you inside for secondary and let a supervisor make the denial decision.

 

[DEEPCUR]

Where do people get this information? No such thing. You will be fine with commuting, but CBP officers are not always well informed and sometimes they will send you to secondary inspection.
Of course every time you enter the US using H4 Visa, the H1B spouse must be already in the US or traveling with you.

The purpose of H4 visa is to join the H1 holder living in US. If the H1 holder doesn’t live in US, H4 visa is moot.

I too was under the impression that having valid H4 visa would be sufficient to commute with H1, but CBP very well know what they are doing in denying H4 commuters. This is not grey area for sure because nobody is successful in commuting daily on H4 visa at different port of entries .

The experience of members on H4 commute is consistent. In addition to this member ybx, another member, I think, rakatatoon also ran in to similar issues. His spouse was denied entry and was asked to get B2 for such travels despite showing a print out of appropriate laws created by attorney. Justinline also quoted a story where H4 holder was denied entry when she attempted to pick up the spouse from US side

 

[DEEPCUR]

We (myself and spouse) live in Canada. Spouse is on H1 and i was on H4.
I was denied entry and asked to get B1/B2, got B1/B2 and no issues there after

but how can you maintain US employment with B1/B2? The whole point of attempting to travel using H4 was for to work in US with H4 EAD right. with B1 / B2 it wouldn’t be possible to work in US

 

[lampbreaker]

Commuters are unfortunately at the mercy of CBP officer's discretion in this matter. They seem to be taking the view that the H1 spouse must be 'living' in the US in order for H4 to enter. If there are enough H4 commuters, they can group together and find some judicial solution to this.

 

[canuck78]

Commuters are unfortunately at the mercy of CBP officer's discretion in this matter. They seem to be taking the view that the H1 spouse must be 'living' in the US in order for H4 to enter. If there are enough H4 commuters, they can group together and find some judicial solution to this.

Likely a waste of time and money. Don’t think any US court is going to support couples living in Canada while commuting to work in the US on H1B and H4. Most likely they will say you have the option to live in the US.

 

[spirit.varun]

We (myself and spouse) live in Canada. Spouse is on H1 and i was on H4.
I was denied entry and asked to get B1/B2, got B1/B2 and no issues there after

Sorry, which one did you get? B1 or B2 ?

 

[DEEPCUR]

Commuters are unfortunately at the mercy of CBP officer's discretion in this matter. They seem to be taking the view that the H1 spouse must be 'living' in the US in order for H4 to enter. If there are enough H4 commuters, they can group together and find some judicial solution to this.

Given that the experience is consistent across borders at different port of entries, CBP should definitely be right in not allowing H4 holders to commute.. no sane country would allow a dependent visa holder to utilize dependent visa without primary holder living in the country.

We are just armchair interpreters using bunch of websites and are concluding that they are acting arbitrarily.