Visiting the US as a Canadian - Question by US border officer

[akbardxb]

While this is a tiny tiny representation of the total, I have two friends who I know original selected the option not to show their place of birth on their CAN passport. Both said this created so many issues at the border (entering the US, as well as other countries) that they modified their passports to add it back in.

I also have a friend (more of an acquantaince really) who pulled a "plead the 5th" at the US border. He said something like "I don't have to answer that question" to which they responded, "yes, and we don't have to let you into the US of A". So he was sent home. This was a decade ago (at least?) and he still has some sort of flag on his profile related to this that creates problems for him.

My worst experience so far has been travel to Moscow on my previous passport. It took three visits to the embassy to get a visa, lots of paperwork and invitation letters from a hotels between Moscow and St Petersburg. Finally when I landed in the middle of the night in Moscow, single traveller, with a lot of photography gear, the questioning was intense. In addition, my connection to St Pete's was six hours away, by train. My fluency in Russian was as good as his English!!! Ultimately an interpreter had to be called. The immigration guy could not believe that anyone would travel to Russia in March / April for a photo shoot as most of it was still frozen. The only good part about the questioning was that I did not have to spend a lot of time at the railway platform exposed to the cold! Made it to the train. Painful experience at the airport, but well worth the pictures I have.

 

[canvis2006]

Even with a Canadian passport many can end up sent to secondary inspection(us immigration). It’s just delays the journey by few mins to an hour. I’ve had experience that at pearson airport for a flight to new york, etc.
There was also a time when the imm officer(usa) just stamped my passport and i proceeded to the gate.
its weird how these things work, can depend on common name, religion, country of birth etc…..specially when you’re muslim.

 

[armoured]

its weird how these things work, can depend on common name, religion, country of birth etc…..specially when you’re muslim.

I've underlined common name above to flag a few issues that overlap with common name - transliteration, full names/aliases and patronymics. Any inconsistencies can easily end up with an individual flagged in various databases because of misidentification/overlaps. I've travelled with a friend who routinely spent an extra 45 mins at some border crossings and not others (the ones with the problems were not USA/Canada/Western Europe either); after the first few times he got an admission from border guard they had a 'hit' (similar name) and had a procedure they had to follos. If they get a potential 'hit' due to these, you'll spend some extra time. Often no way to remove these hits or flags on some names.

-Translit: just think of all the spellings for Muhammad Hashem etc in various languages/alphabets - not just Arabic and English but eg Cyrillic.
-full names/aliases/patronymics - some countries leave out some middle names or patronymics on passports, welcome to your misidentification. 'Customary' identification/usage and nicknames/aliases or multiple generation patronymics confound even more. Not to mention the different markers for patronymics between languages.

 

[747-captain]

That’s a stupid question anyways , they read the place of birth on the passport - so why ask ??? Some officers are funny, I will reply “ oh officer no I was not born in Canada - my place of birth is “__” - it should be on the passport “


No offence but Americans are bad with geography, so just answer- so far my experience at Buffalo land crossing has been good - officers are nice , and Kind - I never wear hat or glasses , they ask me 1 question everytime - where do I live and do I do for a living and what kind of company is it where I work. Everytime I get asked this - and nothing else .

Just out of curiosity, which Buffalo border crossing do you normally take? Peace Bridge, Niagara Falls or Queenston/Lewiston?

 

[Mounat]

As many have already said, the most straightforward answer you can give is also the simplest, the truth. By the time your car reaches the booth, the decision to refer you to secondary is likely already made. If not, lying about something or seeming overly flustered or nervous is sure to increase your odds of referral. Having crossed the border in multiple places, and in both directions, for the past 35 years, there are some patterns that I have noticed which increase questions asked and the odds of referral: driving with non-family (especially other people's children), driving in a vehicle you don't own (not rental), showing up at a land crossing when you live 2,000 miles away, towing a trailer (of any size), being between 18-45 years old, having a thick accent (of any kind), not comprehending the questions being asked, giving answers to questions that weren't asked, being overly friendly with the agent, being overly aggressive with the agent, telling dumb jokes about bombs/terrorism/drugs/illegal immigration etc. And of course, there's the luck of the draw when you randomly run into the a**hole of the month when he's itching to make someone's life just a little more difficult.

All in all, it's not the most pleasant experience you'll ever have but CBP and CBSA agents are mostly harmless.