Vancouver airport POE time needed to activate visa

[vanee 13]

It looks like my POE will be Vancouver. The usual advice for people who need to change planes in the US is to allow 3 hours for the visa to be processed. But how long do you need at the Vancouver airport when it's your POE? Will 2 hours before the flight leaves be enough time, or should I be at the airport earlier?

Thanks for your help.

[Waiting in Vancouver 6]

I went through Vancouver (YVR) as my POE back in July 2006 and I allowed myself 3 hours to check in, go through customs and then through security and I had plenty of time on the other side. If I remember right it only took about 45 minutes from beginning to end.

The real delay would be the line up for customs as they can get rather long at YVR. Depending on the day of the week that you travel you can experience some long delays. I travelled on a Tuesday morning so customs wasn't that busy.

So 2 hours would probably be fine (depending on what day of the week you are travelling) but I was worried and ended up arriving 3 hours before.

[bradcanuck 1]

To make a super long story short I always give myself 3 hours.

[~Nini~ 2]

I always give myself 2 hours ahead of departure on a regular flight. Bee was leaving Vancouver on a 6am flight and not only was the customs lineup long, so was the check-in lineup. This was at 4am on a Sunday morning

Plan on doing three hours for the visa processing, should be enough time to get through and make the plane ride.

[DeadPoolX 9]

As it's been said, allow yourself a good three hours for the whole process. It probably won't take that long, but you never know. Sometimes, Customs can act screwy; even if they don't, I've noticed that when there's a large lineup of people who've recently entered the terminal, at least one Customs officer will decide to take his or her break, making the whole thing go even slower.

Then, of course, you might want to have more time incase the first plane itself is a little late. Even ten to fifteen minutes can make a difference sometimes, so I'd definitely err on the side of caution. I know it's no fun to sit around an airport for a while, but that's better than missing your flight.