Traveling to the US from Canada (as a PR) without PR card

[rcaudill]

Hi,

I am a US citizen and Canadian PR. I have a trip coming up in July (for 10 days) that I must take but my PR card expired and I am still waiting for Citizenship Canada to send it. If I travel back to Canada what will happen? Will I be denied entry or will I need prove my status in Canada? Does this hurt my status in Canada whatsoever? I plan on applying for citizenship when I get back and don't want my trip to screw that up. I also do have the option of traveling across the border using a car if needed but I am running out of vacation days and would love to avoid this if possible.

 

[steaky]

Just use your US passport. Show your expired PR card only when meeting a CBSA officer.

 

[ContactFront]

Your PR card is just a travel document. It doesn't affect your status in any way.

 

[rcaudill]

I forgot to mention that I am traveling via air.

 

[dagget42]

I just went through this myself: https://www.canadavisa.com/canada-immigration-discussion-board/threads/confusion-re-prtd-with-a-us-passport.558517/

So long as you don't tell the airline that you are a permanent resident, you're fine to get by with your passport. If they know you're a permanent resident, they will check for your card and might not let you board without it. The only way they would find this out is if you notify them though, they won't infer from an address or anything like that.

Once you arrive at the border, explain the situation (and that, holy shit, it's 110+ days for a PR card renewal to begin processing at this point so there was no hope of you having it in time to travel). They might pull you into secondary screening but it shouldn't be a big deal and definitely won't impact you.