Travellers
Travelling with a disability
This section summarizes how the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) helps persons with disabilities travel into Canada.
How the CBSA can help with your border crossing
If you are a traveller with a disability, feel free to request assistance from the CBSA upon your arrival. A border services officer will be happy to help.
The CBSA will:
- help you through the steps of the border clearance process, including assistance in completing your declaration and providing verbal or visual cues or additional instructions
- provide you with instructions in writing or, if possible, in American, Quebec or Indigenous sign language
- direct you, and any support person you are travelling with, to an alternate line to help you move more quickly through customs, if you have difficulty waiting in line for disability-related reasons
- help place and retrieve personal items on a counter for inspection, if you must undergo more extensive clearance
Persons with disabilities travelling by air can use the special services counter line that is clearly identified in all CBSA primary inspection areas.
The CBSA also ensures that all signs and displays are accessible.
Know your rights
The Canadian Transportation Agency has developed regulations to ensure that travel is accessible in modes of transport under federal jurisdiction (all air services, as well as most rail, bus, and ferry services). The Accessible Transportation for Persons with Disabilities Regulations (ATPDR) are also applicable to the Canada Border Services Agency and provide a set of specific and legally-binding accessibility requirements on services, technical standards for equipment, communications, training, and security and border screening. Specifically, CBSA is subject to Parts 1 and 5 of the ATPDR.
Related links
Accessibility at the Canada Border Services Agency
Travelling with disabilities outside of Canada
Schedule 1 - Training Program Information
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