# New Passport Rules For Dual Citizens



## colchar (Oct 25, 2011)

I'm not sure if this has been posted here yet, but it is something that will affect a lot of us:


https://www.thestar.com/news/immigr...l-rule-catches-dual-citizens-by-surprise.html


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## EVHB (Feb 11, 2008)

It kind of makes sense to me that, if you are a Canadian Citizen and you are traveling to Canada, that you'll use your Canadian passport... 
I don't even think I will renew my Belgian passport once it expires, as all the places I would like to visit, I can visit as a Canadian too.


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## WestCoastCanadianGirl (Mar 17, 2012)

I recently paid CAD 260$ to renew my passport for 10 years. 

An eTA for the same period of time would cost about CAD 14$. Coupled with the GBP £75 I paid for a 10 year UK passport earlier this year and even factoring in a GBP £1 = CAD 2$ exchange rate, it would be considerably cheaper _not_ to use my Canadian passport to enter Canada and just go with my UK document and buy eTA every 5 years..

As much as it annoys that we can no longer do that (money grab much, G of C?!) I can understand where CIC is coming from. I value my Canadian citizenship enough that I suppose that CAD 260$ is a small price to pay to be able to come and go as I wish.


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## EVHB (Feb 11, 2008)

Why do you need a UK passport? Isn't a valid identity card enough if you want to travel to the UK to visit relatives or friends?


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## JGK (Dec 12, 2009)

EVHB said:


> Why do you need a UK passport? Isn't a valid identity card enough if you want to travel to the UK to visit relatives or friends?


The UK does not have a national Identity card system


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## WestCoastCanadianGirl (Mar 17, 2012)

Also, I'm now ordinary resident in the UK, so it made sense to take out UK citizenship and get a passport. 

If I could have, I probably would have just travelled on that passport and applied for eTA every 5 years so I could go back to Canada as needed. 

Oh well... having the two passports allows me to cherry pick my way around the world and avoid having to apply for tourist visas.


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## vibhu1212 (Jul 17, 2016)

WestCoastCanadianGirl said:


> Also, I'm now ordinary resident in the UK, so it made sense to take out UK citizenship and get a passport.
> 
> If I could have, I probably would have just travelled on that passport and applied for eTA every 5 years so I could go back to Canada as needed.
> 
> Oh well... having the two passports allows me to cherry pick my way around the world and avoid having to apply for tourist visas.


"cherry pick my way around the world" that's a brighter side to all this fuss :heh::heh:


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## colchar (Oct 25, 2011)

EVHB said:


> It kind of makes sense to me that, if you are a Canadian Citizen and you are traveling to Canada, that you'll use your Canadian passport...
> I don't even think I will renew my Belgian passport once it expires, as all the places I would like to visit, I can visit as a Canadian too.


I don't even have a Canadian passport. I only travel to the UK (I used to go to the US but haven't hopped over the border in more than a decade) and it is easier to get into the UK on my British passport. When returning I simply place my Ontario birth certificate in my passport and have no problems (well except for once when a particularly officious french Canadian passport control officer got all uppity with me). But now I will have to go through the hassle and expense of getting a Canadian passport as well.

The new rules would make more sense if they were applied across the board but they are not, they only apply to those traveling by air. If you come in by sea or land you don't need to have a Canadian passport with you. That pretty much shows up the Liberals claims about security to be complete B.S. because, if those claims were true, this new rule would apply to everyone.


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## colchar (Oct 25, 2011)

WestCoastCanadianGirl said:


> I recently paid CAD 260$ to renew my passport for 10 years.
> 
> An eTA for the same period of time would cost about CAD 14$. Coupled with the GBP £75 I paid for a 10 year UK passport earlier this year and even factoring in a GBP £1 = CAD 2$ exchange rate, it would be considerably cheaper _not_ to use my Canadian passport to enter Canada and just go with my UK document and buy eTA every 5 years..
> 
> As much as it annoys that we can no longer do that (money grab much, G of C?!) I can understand where CIC is coming from. I value my Canadian citizenship enough that I suppose that CAD 260$ is a small price to pay to be able to come and go as I wish.



Yeah, it is definitely a money grab.

As for ETA, I read somewhere that dual citizens are not eligible for that. Whether that is a new rule or an older one, I have no idea.


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## WestCoastCanadianGirl (Mar 17, 2012)

It's all part of the $$$ grab. 

How in the H-E-DOUBLE-HOCKEY-STICKS would the CBSA agent know that I'm a Canuck if I presented to passport control at YVR or Pearson on a British passport. 

Unless they had a good look at the bio-data page, there's no telling just by looking at me and listening to my voice where I'm from (I speak English with a BC dialect, I am Japanese but I'm tall and could very easily pass for First Nations or Hawaiian etc etc). 

Oh well... it is what it is and there's nothing I can do about it... I want my daughter to know my parents and my brothers and their children, so I need to be able to take her to Canada without any hassle (her proof of Canadian citizenship paperwork is in Nova Scotia at the moment... hopefully we'll have it back by the end of February).


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## kanadanicht (Aug 18, 2016)

A 10Y Canadian passport costs $160 plus $100 express fees, which, with a bit of planning, can normally be avoided.

Travelling to Cuba earlier this year I paid those extra $100 because I'd become citizen and turned in my PR card just days before. In such situations the 24h passport service is just GREAT. I didn't want to risk taking my citizenship certificate with me to Cuba to travel back to Canada with my German passport, not because I feared the Canadians wouldn't let me in, but because of the possibility of the airline not letting me board in Havana. On way to Canada from German airports I've never been asked any questions about my PR card, even though as a PR one can't enter without. But in Turkey and the Dominican Republic I had to show my PR card several times and with my passport having Canadian "PR" entry stamps all over I would have had NO chance of claiming that I'm a regular tourist.

I'd say the $160 for a Canadian passport are well spent, already because of the ease of travelling to the US, possible international visa hassles aside.

But a stupid question, how does this work in practice when I show up at Canadian immigration with a German passport wanting to enter Canada as a tourist, and the immigration officer sees a popup on the screen that I'm actually Canadian citizen? Normally he would have let me enter as a tourist, but because I'm Canadian he then sends me back to Germany??


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## EVHB (Feb 11, 2008)

Maybe, if you present yourself at the border with not a proper visa and no return ticket, you'll have to prove you are a Permanent Resident or a Citizen, otherwise they can refuse you entry at the border?


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## kanadanicht (Aug 18, 2016)

EVHB said:


> Maybe, if you present yourself at the border with not a proper visa and no return ticket, you'll have to prove you are a Permanent Resident or a Citizen, otherwise they can refuse you entry at the border?


I can't believe a CBSA agent who was about to let me in as an ordinary German tourist would refuse entry when he or she sees that I'm actually also Canadian. The new rule says proof of citizenship or PR is needed to travel to Canada *by air without an eTA*. Then it should still be possible for Canadians to cross land borders on foreign passports. So in case my Canadian passport was stolen overseas, the fastest way to get back might be to apply for ESTA, fly to the US and then cross the land border?


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## WestCoastCanadianGirl (Mar 17, 2012)

CAD 260$ is the cost of a 10 year passport issued outside of North America, and _does *not*_ include "rush" service, which isn't ordinarily available for non-emergency situations.


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## EVHB (Feb 11, 2008)

kanadanicht said:


> I can't believe a CBSA agent who was about to let me in as an ordinary German tourist would refuse entry when he or she sees that I'm actually also Canadian. The new rule says proof of citizenship or PR is needed to travel to Canada *by air without an eTA*. Then it should still be possible for Canadians to cross land borders on foreign passports. So in case my Canadian passport was stolen overseas, the fastest way to get back might be to apply for ESTA, fly to the US and then cross the land border?


You need to apply for eTA up front, if you come by plain. If you cross the border by car, I think they'll issue you an eTA or check your status right there and then?
I know that with ESTA, the American ETA, you either get it up front if you fly by plain, or you get a check at the border crossing when you arrive by car. If you already have a valid ESTA, according to a guy at the border crossing, it goes faster.


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## kanadanicht (Aug 18, 2016)

EVHB said:


> You need to apply for eTA up front, if you come by plain. If you cross the border by car, I think they'll issue you an eTA or check your status right there and then?
> I know that with ESTA, the American ETA, you either get it up front if you fly by plain, or you get a check at the border crossing when you arrive by car. If you already have a valid ESTA, according to a guy at the border crossing, it goes faster.


Crossing land borders ESTA was always optional. I had ESTA and they didn't even notice crossing into NY State, still made me fill the I94W, and the cost is same USD6. The only advantage of ESTA at land borders are 10 questions less to fill on the application form. From what I read on CIC pages, ETA will be just the same.

@WestCoastCanadianGirl $260 regular fee really suck. I always got my German passports in Germany because they are much cheaper, roughly half the cost EUR56?


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## WestCoastCanadianGirl (Mar 17, 2012)

kanadanicht said:


> Crossing land borders ESTA was always optional. I had ESTA and they didn't even notice crossing into NY State, still made me fill the I94W, and the cost is same USD6. The only advantage of ESTA at land borders are 10 questions less to fill on the application form. From what I read on CIC pages, ETA will be just the same.
> 
> @WestCoastCanadianGirl $260 regular fee really suck. I always got my German passports in Germany because they are much cheaper, roughly half the cost EUR56?


That's why dual citizen expat Canadians are complaining... why shell out CAD 260$ for a passport when they could just pay CAD 7$ every 5 years and travel on their other, non-Canadian passport.


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## kanadanicht (Aug 18, 2016)

WestCoastCanadianGirl said:


> That's why dual citizen expat Canadians are complaining... why shell out CAD 260$ for a passport when they could just pay CAD 7$ every 5 years and travel on their other, non-Canadian passport.


This one time, I am not, and trust me normally I am complaining a lot. I regularly travel to the US on weekend trips and the I94W so called visa waiver program turned into a slapstick comedy because of the necessary visa waiver visa. I once had to empty trouser pockets in the interrogation chamber, been threatened life long bans for forgetting I94Ws, and ski busses to VT no longer accept visa waiver candidates unless they already managed to travel to the US otherwise the holy I94W still attached because Canadian customers cannot be subjected to that kind of hassle.

I cannot say how gladly I paid those $260 to be spared this special treatment.


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## JGK (Dec 12, 2009)

WestCoastCanadianGirl said:


> It's all part of the $$$ grab.
> 
> How in the H-E-DOUBLE-HOCKEY-STICKS would the CBSA agent know that I'm a Canuck if I presented to passport control at YVR or Pearson on a British passport.
> 
> ...


I renewed my UK passport and did the application at the same time I applied for my first Canadian passport. 

On of the questions on the UK passport form was "Do you hold a passport of any other nationality?" I don't know if this would be incorporated into the biometrics.


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## colchar (Oct 25, 2011)

JGK said:


> I renewed my UK passport and did the application at the same time I applied for my first Canadian passport.
> 
> On of the questions on the UK passport form was "Do you hold a passport of any other nationality?" I don't know if this would be incorporated into the biometrics.


That is an excellent question.


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## kanadanicht (Aug 18, 2016)

JGK said:


> I renewed my UK passport and did the application at the same time I applied for my first Canadian passport.
> 
> On of the questions on the UK passport form was "Do you hold a passport of any other nationality?" I don't know if this would be incorporated into the biometrics.


Easy with a modern database. Very few people will share the same full name and DOB, unless perhaps you have no middle name in between Peter and Smith. Just like they also know if you are PR when you present your foreign passport.

I don't think the number of passports held be an individual is stored in the biometric chip. German authorities also ask this question because Germans may lose their citizenship when becoming citizens of another country. Your country's authorities may have some other reason why they interest themselves in foreign passports.


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