escape4

Right. There are some countries where after the arrival test, they just call you the next day to confirm your test is negative so it's not usable for travel. We need to hear from someone who went through the process in Canada and what they actually received in print.

sydneyracquelle

Your portal.switchhealth.ca account has a printout suitable for travel from the result of the test upon arrival in Canada.

newzenith1

Latest field report for a short day trip to Seattle and back (I mentioned earlier in this thread a couple of weeks ago):

I live in a small city in Canada, so all western US flights now connect through Vancouver. My SEA->YVR flight landed at 11:29am today (July 5), fortunately last night I was able to fill out the updated ArriveCAN form and got my confirmation number, after providing my full vaccination records. Like I said before, I was able to use my negative COVID lab test report from a local Canadian lab on both outbound and inbound flights, because it's still within 72-hours for both flights.

The lines at YVR customs are a bit long, so I waited in line for about half an hour to get to my interview. The interview with customs officer went smoothly. He did ask a lot of questions (I think he has a new checklist that he needs to go through), before allowing me to continue on my next connection flight from Vancouver to home (without having a mandatory hotel stop-over). After customs, I had to get my checked-in luggage, and walk out of the baggage claim area. At the door, there are staff waiting to guide passengers to perform the day-1 arrival COVID test. All passengers are supposed to pre-register online for the arrival test, but it appears many didn't do that in advance. Fortunately I already registered and had my confirmation number, so I went straight to the LifeLabs registration counter. There they printed me a lab requisition form using the pre-registered information I entered online last night. However, when I went to the next line, ready to take my on-site arrival test, some LifeLabs staff directed me to get a home test kit and move on to catch my connection flight. It is possible that they decided I don't have enough connection time (my next flight departs at 1:30pm), and the waiting lines for the arrival test are a bit long.

In any case, I arrived home a few hours later, and registered online again using the home kit (and got a new order ID than the lab requisition form printed at the airport), and scheduled a virtual appointment with LifeLabs staff to collect the sample myself at home. It appears that LifeLabs is very under-staffed for the at-home test sessions, and my observer showed up 45 minutes past the original scheduled timeslot. I was glad that I waited patiently enough for her to show up. Before I attend the virtual appointment, make sure you've watched the instruction video (in the appointment confirmation email) so you know what to prepare. I also called FedEx in advance for them to come pick up the sample, but the earliest time they can come is tomorrow 9am-5pm. In any case, I hope the home test sample gets delivered smoothly, and I no longer need to worry about the mandatory quarantine from this trip.

tryinginvain

Just curious, are you only able to enter 1 vaccine card/image? I had one pfizer in the US and one in Canada. If you can only enter one image I’ll need to create an image consisting of both documents.

under2100

No, separate file per dose. They say to enter the same file twice if both doses are on the same document.

escape4

Thanks! Sounds like this is thing is clunky for people not living in Canada. I tried to create an account and it kept refusing my postal code and I ended up having to enter a fake one with too many digits in order to go through. And the SMS required to log in, there is a link "receive e-mail instead" which gets an error message.

zrh2yvr

This is correct - However - be very careful if you intend to use your day 8 test for departure (assuming you need to do one). Your sample collection time will be stamped as the time you setup your test kit bar-code in the account. As I was eager to make sure it was all setup correctly - I entered my bar-code the day I arrived so my sample time was officially stamped as 10 days old when I got the results . . .

newzenith1

I arrived YVR from US today and presented full vaccination records and was allowed to come in and continue onto my domestic connection flight without the mandatory hotel stay. One thing to note: at YVR they usually conduct on-site COVID arrival test (by LifeLabs) after you walk out of baggage claims. However, today maybe because the line for on-site arrival test at YVR is too long, they gave me a home test kit and asked me to take the day 1 test at home (similar to what land-arrival people do).

After I registered the home test kit online and booked their 15-minute virtual appointment, the observer from LifeLabs didn't arrive on time. In fact, it took them 45 minutes past the original scheduled time to come onto the Microsoft Teams session, so patience is very important. My Teams session actually terminated itself automatically after 30 minutes, and I had to rejoin again and waited for another 15 minutes to meet the observer and finish my session.

zrh2yvr

That's great - it will be interesting to see if they move to only self test on arrival - as I don't think it is about safety at this point but only statistics to see how many they can find. From that they will decide how to move forward and remove testing requirements for vaccinated people (like much of Europe has done).

rankourabu

What would be preferable is removing the pre departure test. I ll trade that in for keeping the arrival test 😀

jetplane86

Did you just upload an image of your CDC card (US)? I'm worried the text may not be super legible, particularly location if that matters.

Finkface

I did. I just used my CDC card.

yvrcnx

I think the way Australia is justifying the measures is by comparing how many people have died from the virus.
With a population of just over 25 million, Australia had 910 deaths while Canada with a population of just over 37 million had 26,381. From their viewpoint, they have saved over 25,000 lives.
I am not agreeing with how they are handling every little outbreak but I can also see why they do what they do.
That's probably why Canada took and is taking these measures like closing off the country to any foreigners etc.

Finkface

Here is my experience returning to Canada today. Canadian citizens, fully vaxxed, flying into YVR. I filled out ArriveCan yesterday and uploaded my CDC card. It showed an I next to my name for Immunized. On arrival, it took maybe 45 seconds to get through CBSA. We have Nexus so walked right up to an agent but the line for regular agents was pretty long. One girl said she had been waiting 2 hours so presumably, a full flight had come in just before us. I had everything ready; ArriveCan code, test results and CDC vaccine cards. It literally took less than a minute. The guard told us we do not have to isolate at all, even while waiting for our arrival test results, that we were totally free to go with no restrictions. He gave us each a handout and said to read it. I just stuck it in my bag but, as I later learned, make sure you keep it handy as that is your only proof that you have been cleared/exempted from quarantine because of being vaccinated through the next parts of the process. You exit as normal (after collecting any checked bags), handing in your CBSA form. LifeLabs is set up just past the doors. You are directed to the left if you haven’t registered (super long line) and to the right if you have preregistered, which I had done, and there were maybe 5 people there. They check your registration and ask for that handout from CBSA. I could hear at least three other people saying they threw it out. Fortunately I still had ours because without it, you can’t prove your vaxed status as verified by CBSA. Interestingly, even though I used my Nexus number to register with LifeLabs (they give you a choice of passport or Nexus), they will not accept a Nexus card as ID. They insisted on my passport which was buried in my bag. It annoyed me as what was the point of allowing me to use it to register if they don’t accept it as ID? Anyway, you then walk out the doors to the public arrivals area and get in line for the actual test. There were maybe 20 people ahead of us but it went very fast. There are a lot of testing stations. They ask again for that CBSA handout so keep it ready. After your test, as you walk out, there is a person there who hands out the day 8 test. They want to see that handout one more time. No day 8 test for the fully vaxxed and they just wave you on once you show that handout. That’s it. We are totally free as of now and the whole process from plane seat to sidewalk took about 15 minutes. It would have been a whole lot longer without Nexus, if I wasn’t organized and had everything ready, and especially being pre-registered with Lifelabs. Below is a screenshot of the front and back of the handout from CBSA that you have to show at least three times.

WildcatYXU

I'm returning to Canada Saturday and I have a weird problem with the app. I simply can't find the newest version in the app store. I'm fully vaccinated, so I really wouldn't want to spend any of my precious home time in some hotel. But I can only see the version 2.19.9 released on June 29. Is there any trick to download the July 5 version?