BIRD TALK

Dear Bird Talk,

Further to my discussions with your office about whether to use the Nexus Lane or not, I have taken your advice and talked to 2 different members of Nexus office in Blaine Washington and gotten two different opinions. My concern was that all the literature treats this lane as a commuter lane and snowbirds aren’t really commuters. However, they also say that it’s a lane for low-risk travellers to take the load off the border-crossing system and Snowbirds would certainly qualify as low-risk.

The first person that I talked to said that as long as we strictly followed all the guidelines and had our cards, then we could use it. Later, when I questioned the second one on some of the items we were planning to take with us to Arizona, he recommended we use the regular lane, especially since we weren’t really commuting.

So, I think the bottom line is that if you aren’t taking very many food products or any quantities of anything that might suggest you are going to sell it in the US, then you can use the lane. However, if there is anything questionable then you are better to go through the regular lane.

Because of the length of stay of most snowbirds in the US, it naturally means one takes a lot of “stuff”. So, under the current rules, it doesn’t seem that the Nexus lane is very beneficial for us and we have probably wasted $80 each plus the time and expense of a trip to Blaine Washington to get our cards.

We would be interested in hearing what experiences other snowbirds have had and whether they recommend using it.

Thank-you for your assistance.

Regards!
Dianne & George Kolenosky

Response:
There have been conflicting opinions about what value a NEXUS pass may have to snowbirds. Your practical experience sheds a lot of light on the subject. Thank you for sharing it with the rest of us.