Canadian Expat returning to Canada from US boggled by red tape

[wisdomwild]

I am a 50 year old Canadian citizen who has been living and working in the US for a little less than 20 years and I am now moving home again. I have my valid Canadian passport, I think I have a copy of my Ontario birth certificate somewhere, I was educated and certified in my career in Ontario, I own property outside of a car etc in either the US or Canada at the moment, currently working in US but looking for work now in Canada again. I may be offered a job in Ontario at any time and be required to start work in a few weeks and now I am boggled at the paperwork before me. Can I even accept a position in Ontario now?

I need to:
1) reactivate my SIN card (although I have been active in Ontario often because my parents lived there and I am handling their will and am joint on some of their accounts now that they are recently deceased, does that maintain any activation of SIN number or bank accounts in any way?)
2) open a bank account in Ontario. Should I just open on with the bank where my parents were banking and where I have been dealing with that situation?
3) I have a valid drivers license from NC now and I need to have my Ontario license renewed. Must I start over as a new driver? My job depends on me having a valid license, how do I accomplish this if I must start over in Ontario and my NC license may not remain valid after 90 days?
4) What is the order in which I can obtain or reactivate or renew my Canadian or Ontario identification including OHIP, SIN, license, residency etc if I am joint on the account with my deceased parents estate and have my valid CDN passport? Getting one ID depends on getting another ID, which depends on proving something else.
5) How can my credit score in the US be transferred back to Canada?
6) How long can this whole process take? If I am offered a job, can I even accept it?

Help, help and many thanks!

 

[21Goose]

1. Check to see if your SIN is still active here - https://www.payroll.ca/Resources/Tools/SIN-Verification-Tool. If it is active, you don't need to do anything. If it's dormant, you will need to reactivate it.

2. Entirely up to you. You can open a bank account whereever you like.

3. You can get a full license by submitting a drivers abstract and surrendering your NC license.. Read how here - https://drivetest.ca/licences/licence-exchanges/licence_exchange.html

4. You already have an ID (passport). Get the SIN first, if it's not already active, and then get everything else after that. The rest of the documents don't really depend on each other as long as you have a SIN and an ID.

5. It doesn't transfer, but depending on what you want (bank loans, car loan etc.) you can ask them to consider your US history. Some places will, others won't.

6. Hard to say. OHIP will take 3 months, but the rest is quick. If you have a valid SIN you can accept any job you like, you're a citizen.

 

[canuck78]

These things aren’t really hard. Not sure why you didn’t expect to have to have to reapply or activate things like SIN. Unless you have been working or filing taxes SIN wouldn’t have been used and it is a good thing they go dormant to prevent identity fraud. You have to wait 3 months to reactivate ohip so that people can’t return just to access healthcare. Most of these things can be accomplished in less than a day so wouldn’t worry.