Asked a freind to bring my car

[thosse2]

Hello,


I have recently landed in Canada. Before landing I was visiting my family back in my home country. Before that I was in the States doing my Ph.D. and I left my stuff there to go back later and bring them to Canada. Now I have applied for my return visa to US and still waiting for it to get ready. Meanwhile, it came to my mind that I ask one of my friends (who is US citizen) to drive my car to Canada so that I have it until I want to go back to States. I was thinking that I can import it later when I bring my belongings when I am coming back from the States to permanently stay in Canada.
At the border (Detroit and Windsor) my friend easily drove the car to Canada. He told the officer that he is bringing my car and they let him enter Canada. But they stopped his wife (who is also US citizen) while she was driving her own car to come this side and give his husband a ride back to US.
They stooped her for more than 2 hours, until my friend decided to go back to the border (entering US and coming back to Canada). This time they said that driving someone else's car is illegal, although they knew that the other officer let my friend to enter Canada.
Finally after almost 5-6 hours and filing some documents against them, they let them go back to US without letting them entering Canada.
They initially thought that my friend and his wife are trying to illegally drive a car for me (they thought that I am also illegally here in Canada). After they checked my name and information, they let them go back to the States. They had another set of problems at the US border because officers got suspicious at them because they were entering and exiting the border twice in a short time.

Now I am confused. What is correct? Is it correct that he could not drive my car to Canada? Can I have my car (registered in US) for a short time when I am visiting Canada? I will go back to States for almost 8 months to finish my Ph.D. and do a short time postdoctoral fellowship. So I am temporarily staying in Canada. So it does not make sense that I import my car here and then to US and then again to Canada. I want to have it now here in Canada and then drive it to States, use it there for almost 8 months and then bring it to Canada. I was thinking that I can import it at that time.
Please help me what I can do now and whether I can file against the border officers who stopped my friend. It cost me a lot to go to Windsor and come back without having my car.

Please share your thoughts and opinions which can help me understand my options and alternatives.

 

[links18]

You have a confusing situation. There is nothing that says a person can't drive someone else's car into Canada. But CBSA can use that fact in weighing someone's admissibility to the country. It would have been much easier to just have met your friend at the border and imported the car at that time. Of course, the car is also supposed to be properly exported from the USA. Could you have given your friend a notarized letter giving him permission to export the vehicle and then you could have met him on the Canadian side to import it?

In situations like this it might be best to call the respective ports directly before taking any action to find out what they require.

 

[apple3981]

Confusing indeed...

 

[PMM]

Hi

Confusing indeed...

Not really the OP was NOT in Canada at the time and his friend was going to drop off a US car in Canada, that no arrangements had been made to either export it from the US or import into Canada.

 

[J1visa]

Your situation is not complicated as it was. I imported my Car from the US to Canada, it is easy but costs me few hundred dollars. After few months in Canada, I drove back to the US without any challenge. I then re-registered my car in the US (it costs me $30+ US car insurance to have a new title, and they don't care that I did exported my car to Canada). Now I will drive to Canada again using my Canada plate as my car still has a Canada registration, and I never export it from Canada.

You will have a PhD so you can apply for E1B easily, but it is now difficult for PhD Holders to find an academic position in the US and Canada (except postdoc positions with about 30K-40K/year).