Traveller Facilitation and Compliance

The Canada Border Service Agency's (CBSA) Travellers Facilitation and Compliance Program ensures that people and goods coming into Canada are following Canadian customs and immigration laws. This program collects personal information under the Customs Act, the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, and the Immigration and Refugee Protection Regulations. The information collected depends on each person's situation.

To ensure that these laws are being followed, Border Services Officers (BSO) collect personal information about individuals and their goods through primary processing. Primary processing can involve an in-person or telephone interview and filling out paper forms. If the BSO decides that all reporting requirements have been met at this stage, the traveller is allowed to enter Canada.

If the BSO sees that the traveller still has customs or immigration requirements to complete, the individual is sent to secondary processing. Secondary processing helps officers confirm duties, taxes, immigration admissibility, and residency requirements. Being sent to secondary does not mean the traveller has done anything wrong.

The program uses a Traveller Compliance Indicator (TCI), an algorithmically-generated indicator that predicts if a traveller is likely to follow customs laws. The TCI is an additional element that helps BSOs decide whether a traveller can enter Canada right away or should complete additional steps. The actual decision on whether to conduct further examinations on a traveller will still be made by the BSO, whose specialized training, expertise, and knowledge allows them to make admissibility decisions. The aim of this indicator is to save time by allowing officers to focus more attention on travellers whose compliance is uncertain.

If the algorithm does not predict a high likelihood of compliance, no indicator appears. The absence of an indicator can mean the system does not have enough information, the traveller has past customs enforcements on file, the algorithm does not predict a high customs compliance, or TCI is not available at that port of entry. Not having an indicator does not mean the traveller is a risk.

The TCI is generated using an algorithm that analyzes information from a traveller's current border crossing and their past two years of CBSA interactions. It identifies travel patterns that historically match travellers who follow all customs rules. The algorithm was trained on depersonalized data and tested to ensure it works well and does not rely on biased or overly simple patterns.

The program collects, uses, discloses, retains, and protects personal information required to process travellers. All personal information is handled according to the Privacy Act and CBSA policies and procedures. Safeguards are in place to protect personal information throughout its lifecycle, including physical, administrative and technical controls, training, oversight mechanisms, and retention and disposal practices.

Right of access

The personal information collected by the Traveller Facilitation and Compliance Program will be held according to the timeframes outlined in the Retention Disposition Strategy before being destroyed. Further information about this activity is described by Personal Information Bank Travellers Processing - CBSA PPU 1101, available in the Information about Programs and Information Holdings (formerly Info Source).

Individuals may formally request access to their personal information or access to corporate records related to or created by the Traveller Facilitation and Compliance Program by contacting the CBSA Information Sharing, Access to information and Chief Privacy office (ISATICPO).

Accountability

The CBSA Vice President of the Travellers Branch is accountable for personal information collected, used, disclosed, and retained within the Traveller Facilitation and Compliance Program. Travellers who have concerns about how their personal information is collected, used, shared, or stored can submit a written complaint to the CBSA Information Sharing, Access to Information and Chief Privacy Office (ISATICP) Office. Complaints should include the traveller's name, contact information, and a brief description of their concerns. Contact information for the ISATICP Office is available at: Access to information and privacy - Contact us.