Thanks. I guess the biggest difference is that at least there's no way they can deny a PR entry into Canada even if they do take you into questioning, but of course that's an experience we'd both rather avoid.
In a nutshell, my wife and I (girlfriend at the time) got caught in a lie because we had to prove her ties back to USA, but the thing is, she had pretty much packed her bags, got rid of her place back in the US, quit her job, and relocated to Canada on the basis that we'd first try things out for a few months here in Vancouver before she'd eventually settle in Seattle.
We were paranoid the CBSA would deny entry to her if we said anything other than that she was just visiting me in Canada, and ironically enough, they called us on our bluff and gave us hell because they suspected she was moving to Canada given that we were picking up some stuff that she had shipped just past the border. After a few hours of questioning, they eventually denied us entry and demanded a letter of employment / mortgage letter (since we had fibbed and said that she had residence back home) before they'd allow us to enter.
At this point it was a complete nightmare because she had all her stuff at my house, including her car and our dog, and we had to rent a dingy hotel to sort out what we were going to do the next day. We ended up returning to the border, trying to extend on the lie by providing some random documents, but CBSA caught us on that too and gave us even bigger hell the next day. You know what's funny is that actually, we did go to a different border after getting denied admission into Canada that first night and they also questioned us thoroughly on that as well.
Anyways, that next day, we ended up getting questioned for over 7 hours at the border, eventually breaking us down to the point where we came clean with the real story, and at which point the officer in charge decided to have mercy and issue a visitor record for her. Recognizing that it could have turned out VERY differently in that she could have been issued an exclusion order instead even after telling the truth, we decided we'd rather just stay in Canada and try the sponsorship route since we had been planning on getting married anyways, but needless to say, even a niggling thought of even going near the CBSA is extremely unappealing!
I do agree with you - you're at the complete mercy of whichever officer gets you at the CBSA . I'm convinced that had the situation been in the hands of our first officer, we probably would have gotten the exclusion order rather than the visitor record. He was extremely harsh and seemed like he was on a mission to deny us the first night. The second officer the next day was more confused about why we had been denied entry in the first place, but was cheerful up until he suspected and correctly deduced that we were lying, then gave the big brother speech at the end of the ordeal after we came clean.
You were definitely better prepared than us.
