US immigration cruise starts in Canada

[Lolou127]

Hello, we’re doing a coastal Pacific cruise that’s starts in Vancouver and our first US port is Seattle, am I right to assume that if we go ashore there we’ll do US immigration? As it’s a 4000 person ship could this realistically take a few hours? What happens if we’ve booked a tour to go on via the cruise line?

[d9704011]

You’ll pre-clear US Immigration in Vancouver.

[Lolou127]

Thank you Cool Cruiser x

[martincath]

Not always true unfortunately. You only preclear when there are no other Canadian ports after Vancouver. Sometimes coastals go Vancouver to Victoria (or very rarely Nanaimo) then on down the coast - there's no preclearance for those so you would have to factor in immigration at your first US port. If you have booked a cruise excursion, they'll almost certainly prioritize you and the other folks on those for getting clearance!

 

If the first port after Vancouver is Seattle, though, you will be precleared before boarding here - so budget for extra time for the boarding process and direct any complaints to your own government, as it's CBP who control how many agents are working...

[Lolou127]

Our first stop is Victoria, I’m from the U.K., how can our government control how many agents are working?

[d9704011]

Ah, this is an entirely different scenario than what I originally understood.  If you’re stopping in Victoria before heading off to Seattle then there will be no pre-clearance in Vancouver nor Victoria; you’ll have to deal with CBP (US Immigration) upon arrival in Seattle.  As for martincath’s observation about the number of agents working the pre-clearance I think he/she simply thought you were a US citizen. 

[NantahalaCruiser]

7 hours ago, Lolou127 said:

Hello, we’re doing a coastal Pacific cruise that’s starts in Vancouver and our first US port is Seattle, am I right to assume that if we go ashore there we’ll do US immigration? As it’s a 4000 person ship could this realistically take a few hours? What happens if we’ve booked a tour to go on via the cruise line?

Since your first stop is another Canadian port, US immigration will occur in Seattle (assuming that Victoria does not have US pre-clearance capability.) And it is not IF WE GO ASHORE - you will be required to go through US immigration and thus MUST go ashore.

Edited April 5, 2019 by NantahalaCruiser

[d9704011]

And BTW, if you have booked a tour through the cruise line the timing will all be arranged so that you’ll make that OK no matter how long the CBP process in Seattle.

[martincath]

9 hours ago, Lolou127 said:

Our first stop is Victoria, I’m from the U.K., how can our government control how many agents are working?

Since your profile doesn't say where you're from, I played the odds and guessed you were Americans... my apologies! I should have guessed you're a fellow foreigner when you said 'immigration' rather than Customs. As to how you could influence CBP staffing... given all the wonderful new deals apparently waiting in the wings for after Brexit, I'm sure Boris and JRM have some connections in the Whitehouse;-)

 

Since you will definitely be doing immigration in Seattle but I have no idea how many ships are in that day/how well-staffed CBP will be/and how many other Not Americans will be cruising it's impossible to even ballpark how long your immigration will take.  Sometimes foreigners get lucky - even if there's just one agent running an 'Other citizens' desk if there are only a handful of you, you'll get through quickly! You should definitely arrange your ESTA in advance if you don't already have one - in theory you can still use the old I94W forms and pay $6pp at the border for land or sea entry, but even if they do have the forms on hand it'll take longer and you'll probably get an extra grilling about why you didn't apply in advance...

[Lolou127]

Thanks everyone for the information, MartinCath we do have ESTA’s already so that’s one thing off the to do list, I’ve looked on the NCL website and for our cruise they don’t currently offer any tours for Seattle but I’ll keep checking