Originally Posted by
Salisbury5
Boy did I ever learn that lesson the hard way.
Two weeks ago I flew SFO-YUL and brought home 4 pounds of See's Candies (2 pounds dark and 2 pounds milk chocolate for those of you who are curious - but I digress) in my carry-on. On the declaration card, after careful deliberation, I answered YES to the "Do you have food question" (chocolate is a dairy product after all).
It was my first time using my NEXUS card in arrival at a Canadian airport so I understandably wanted to use it. The system works amazing unless you need to go see an agent. Because of my YES answer about the food, I was sent to secondary and its very long line (I did however get the see one of the border guards who is regularly on Border Security - but I digress again).
After 45 minutes, I made it to a customs agent (not the TV celebrity much to my utter disappointment) who was perplexed by why I was in secondary in the first place. She spied my carry-on and said "Is that the only baggage you have? - and waved me out and on my way.
Next time I will stand in line to see an agent and not use my NEXUS card - or I will forget about the chocolate.
Likely poor discretion on the initial agent's part. I think one time I was coming back from Hawaii with macadamia nuts and declared yes for food and the agent taking at my card before exiting saw I had marked food and just asked what food I was bringing back. After saying it was macadamia nuts, he just laughed it off and sent me on my way.
Also, curious if YVR is set up different from YUL for food stuff. Instead of going to "real" secondary, at YVR there appears to be a special food/agriculture(?) area which was pretty dead. Had to surrender some fricken awesome beef/pork jerky from Macau once. But that time I think we went initially to an agent because the Nexus machines were down.