I’m from India as well mate, should’ve have mentioned that earlier, sorry. So can I start an account in Scotia Bank /TD bank from here itself? At the moment I’ve got an account in HDFC and ICICI. Wait, is there a tax on converting INR to CAD? Ufffff. Have to figure the conversion rates as well. Which of the two banks do you use scotia or TD?
And for flights I’m thinking of landing in Toronto so I’m looking at Delhi-Toronto direct because I don’t want to have to get transit visas and all.
There's a 20% tax withholding if you send out more than 7 lacs in total from India in a fiscal year. You can only get this back once you file your returns and they are accepted (so maybe, May 2024).
Talk to HDFC and ICICI both, get the best rate and open an account in Scotia. I'd to open 4 accounts across different banks as Scotia only allows us to transfer a max of $50k and the account can only be activated once you land. Of all the accounts I opened, Scotia was the easiest for me to work with. I had transferred some to ICICI Canada as well(they've an upper limit of $100k), took me a bank visit and 3-4 awkward customer support calls to get my account activated. When you transfer the amount, you won't be able to wire it if the amount is higher than 10 lacs, you'll be asked to write a check with the banking services you select.
To avoid 20% tax withholding I transferred almost everything to Canada(as much as I could) before June 2023 when the tax withholding was still 5%.
You won't need transit visas if your layover is less than 6 hours through KLM, Lufthansa or British Airways - but your choice if you wish to fly Air India or Air Canada.
Other few checklist items worth getting done:
1. DL extract + updated license(make sure your DL isn't laminated, as those are rejected here)
2. If you've any documents where you might want to get your name changed