POE In Maine (and importing car)

[mikemccor82 0]

Hey Guys,

Can someone direct me to a thread about dealing with going through the POE. I am certain there are threads on this that can answer my question So if someone would be nice enough to direct me there that would be awesome.

Received passport with visa and sealed envelope. My wife and I need to head to Maine (closest port of entry). Just wondering what to expect. We are not moving down there quite yet but we want to get this done and out of the way.

So we just bring our passports and sealed envelope? Does it matter what time of the day we go through? Is an appointment necessary?

Also Is it worth importing the car now or should we wait until we are going to stay down there permanently?

2011 Toyota Matrix, any tips and what do we need.

Thanks!

[A'n'L 735]

What kind of visa do you have? Are you planning on driving or flying? How long until you move permanently?

Unfortunately I only found one (outdated) POE review for Maine on VJ. Hopefully someone else have entered there and can fill you in:-)

[NovaSprings 89]

I entered on a CR1 through Calais ME on Feb 22, 2016, I also imported my vehicle at the same time. We arrived at the POE (new crossing not the old one downtown) at 9:30 am and were done within 45 min. The crossing may be busier now, due to the time of year and number of tourists. Other than your passport and the sealed doc you will need all your doc's to import your car. Getting this paperwork can be a lot of work. The first thing you need to do is contact the manufacture to get a letter from them called a certificate of compliance. How easy or difficult it will be to import your car will depend on what the letter says. I have read that some manufactures will not even give you the letter. Since you will be obligated to register the car in the US once it is imported, I would not import until you are here permanently. Depending on the type of visa you have...you may have 1 year to import your car....but would need to know your visa type. I can provide more specifics on importing your car or POE if you need.

[chiggins82 88]

I was able to get my letter of compliance really quickly from Toyota.

Email them at Toyota_feedback@toyota.ca

You will need a pic of the CMVSS sticker which should be inside the driver side front door of your car and your VIN.

I was able to get my letter of compliance by email in a couple days.

Hope that helps.

I didn't cross in Maine, but I did go by land and it was similar experience to what was said above. For me, the people at the border we VERY unfamiliar with how to process my visa and had to dig into their training. They need to give you some papers when you cross for your car. Make sure you get these. Cannot remember what they called them but you will need them to get a title for your car.

[mikemccor82 0]

Hey Guys. Thanks for the quick reaponse! It is a CR-1 visa for my wife. We are driving down and probably going through Houlton, Me. We have an uncle that lives in Houlten that we always make a visit to.

So we don't need to make an appointment?

We are planning on going down to Madsachusetts for a weekend to go to a Red Sox game and take care of a few things at our apartment.

Later in the summer, probably around August, we are going to officially move. So it's better to register the car then?

[chiggins82 88]

I would get the letter of compliance soon just so you know (not all cars meet the safety standards... I would assume a 2011 Toyota would, but you never know!)

No appointment, just be ready to hang at the border for a little while. Mine took about 90 minutes.. but I was importing pets as well. I would recommend going in the day time. I landed there later in the day and supervisors had gone home.. I had to convince the border person to call them when there was some discrepancy over how to do the paperwork. Was really frustrating! I went through Dunsieth ND apparently they don't get a lot of K-1's there!

[NikLR 13,231]

Remember once you activate your visa you are no longer a Canadian resident and do not qualify for provincial healthcare.

When you POE it's easy to import your car But you have 1 year to do it. Make sure you have the compliance letters and that you dont have a loan on it.

[mikemccor82 0]

Thanks for the info again.

We will still have health insurance through our jobs so I don't think losing provincial health care will be an issue.

Am I right in assuming this?

Also should I do everything at once or do I need to get to a POE within a certain year or 6 months?

[NikLR 13,231]

Your POE has to be done within the expiry date on the visa, which should be within 6 months of the medical. After POE, you have 1 year to import a car and 10 years to import your belongings without duty. (Imported cars aka not made in NA, still may have a duty fee.)

[mikemccor82 0]

Very good information.

Do you know who I may be able to contact about the health coverage? We both work jobs under a contract and the end of the contract happened to coincide with this process finishing up. We both are out of work contracts in September but the six months is up in august.

Would we lose health coverage from our work after going through the POE in the next few weeks?

[NikLR 13,231]

Contact your HR department because generally in Canada, extra health coverage is exactly that. It covers above what is covered by provincial care but isn't a replacement. It may also have. Residency requirement but it may be more lax than provincial.

[HollywoodNorth 22]

Letter of compliance is needed for the Toyota, there shouldn't be any issues since its a Canadian made car and is covered under NAFTA so no duties are involved.

Time of day doesn't really matter too much but as far as I remember POE shift changes are at 12AM, 8AM and 4PM I believe. All that would matter is if you get someone who is fresh on duty with your paperwork vs someone who was on shift for 8 hours.

That being said I crossed in WA state at 1:30am in the morning and was in/out of the whole process [i-551 activation and importing a vehicle] in 10 minutes.

[Mad & J 25]

Hey Guys. Thanks for the quick reaponse! It is a CR-1 visa for my wife. We are driving down and probably going through Houlton, Me. We have an uncle that lives in Houlten that we always make a visit to.

So we don't need to make an appointment?

We are planning on going down to Madsachusetts for a weekend to go to a Red Sox game and take care of a few things at our apartment.

Later in the summer, probably around August, we are going to officially move. So it's better to register the car then?

My fiancee (now wife) and I went through the Houlton POE in January on a K1 visa. We imported my Toyota Prius 2012.

The compliance letter was super easy to get from Toyota, and free. I would recommend officially importing your car when you activate your visa, it'll be easier. I had a picture of my license plate, a picture of my EPA and CMVSS stickers, my registration and my letter of compliance. The officer who handled my car import paperwork didn't even step outside to look at the car. Maybe cause it was January and really cold!

We had no appointment, showed up in the middle of the day on a Friday. We were in and out in less than 30 minutes and everyone was pleasant. You can look at the end of my timeline for a more detailed review: http://www.visajourney.com/timeline/profile.php?id=203168

[NovaSprings 89]

OP, not sure if you have come across this, but this guide and associated web site is what I used. I had all the forms pre-filled out, which made things very quick and easy. I also did as Mad &J suggested and took pictures of the EPA sticker. My car is a 2014 Audi A4 so it was originally manufactured in the US so it also had all of the FMVSS stickers. My letter from Audi indicated that my odometer and speedometer needed to be set to imperial from metric. I was able to do this myself via the vehicle settings, I took a picture of this as well, so the CO only went to the car to confirm the odometer reading. If you are unable to change your odometer/speedometer from metric to imperial, the following information is on the website....you might want to keep this handy in case the CO gives you a hard time.

• If the manufacturer’s letter states that the vehicle complies with all applicable FMVSS except for those pertaining to the speedometer or headlights, the vehicle can still be imported as a conforming motor vehicle under Box 2B.

http://www.nhtsa.gov/cars/rules/import/

Hope this helps...good luck. BTW I also had lots of paperwork from the moving company on my household goods that where to follow later...they didn't even want to look at that.

Edited June 7, 2016 by NovaSprings