We should renew our PR cards soon and the application for renewal asks that we include all travel history. As a truck driver crossing the US border almost every week I am not sure I will collect all accurate info by myself. I wanted to obtain this info through CBSA but they say do not to ask for travel history, just check the form for the option to release your report. If you are renewing or applying for a Permanent Resident Card you do not need to request your Traveller History Report from the CBSA. Checking "Yes" on page 3, Question 23 (section E) of the application form allows IRCC to collect the report on your behalf. So PR Renewal form says I must include all travel history, and CBSA says otherwise. Any truck drivers here, or anybody who frequently travels to the US can help me with the advice on what should I do? Thanks
A Preliminary Observation:
The failure to keep personal records can be a problem. The PR is the one BEST source of reliable information about the PR's travel history, since the PR is the one person in the whole world who was for certain there, and in a position to make a complete and accurate record, each and every time the PR exited Canada, each and every time the PR entered Canada. Since the burden of proving dates present in Canada is on the PR (both for purposes of status determinations, such as attendant an application for a new PR card, and to document presence when applying for citizenship), it can hurt making the case if the best evidence is not available. So, going forward, remember it is important to keep an ongoing record of dates of exit and dates of entry.
Reconstructing Travel History From Various Records:
There are multiple sources of records and information which a PR can use to help reconstruct his or her travel history. You have identified one of the key sources, your CBSA travel history. You can and given your failure to keep complete records almost certainly should request your CBSA travel history. Despite the instructions, a PR is entitled to obtain these records. For the vast majority of PRs, those who have properly kept personal travel history records themselves, this is not necessary, and IRCC and CBSA both discourage requests for these records because of the demand on government resources unnecessary requests impose. But if you need them (and apparently you do), again you can request these. (You still check the item in the application allowing IRCC to also obtain these records, and no need to include your copy with your application.)
The CBSA travel history should be accurate and completely show all dates of entry. Inaccuracies are rare. Omissions are not common but can happen. Date of exit information may also be obtained. I am less familiar with the accuracy or completeness of these exit records, noting that they may depend on input from other sources like the U.S. and its capturing of your entries into the U.S.
You should also be able to obtain similar information, as to dates of entry into the U.S., from the U.S. Customs and Border Protection. I am even less familiar with the accuracy or completeness of these records.
As a professional truck driver your logs should be a good source of information as well.
Since you are reconstructing records, and it is important to get the information you submit to IRCC as complete and accurate as possible (and acknowledge uncertainty where appropriate), best to use as many sources as you can, and cross reference all the information, aiming to get it as accurate and complete as possible. So in addition to CBSA travel history and U.S. I-94 records, your trucking logs, you might want to cross-reference information in other sources, like banking records, including credit card transactions, and cell phone records, pay slips, among other records. A hassle, sure, but too late to avoid that now given the failure to keep ongoing records.
Just how thorough you will want to be, how much effort you put into getting all the dates right, might depend on how long and well settled in Canada you have been. The longer you have been settled in Canada, the less critical it is to get every date and get it right (but if it you are, more or less, getting it close rather than totally accurate and complete, again acknowledge the extent to which there is some uncertainty). In contrast, if you are
cutting-it-close in terms of being in compliance with the PR Residency Obligation, then it is obviously more important to get the dates as complete and accurate as possible.
