We wrote up a post yesterday mentioning that the government is issuing warnings on the media that they may implement stricter travel restrictions. At the very least, they admit that it is being considered.
In my post, I mentioned that if the government “warns” us, chances are they will actually do it. They are just bracing us for the eventual news. I just wanted to mention a few reasons why I feel that more travel restrictions are coming.
Today’s post was triggered by a report from CBC: Garneau won’t rule out invoking Emergencies Act to limit pandemic travel.
Note that we recently wrote a post entitled: Update on Canadian Travel Restrictions. So today’s post is to add onto what was already mentioned there, so if you want a more complete picture, we definitely recommend reading that post first.
We continue to add to our collection of posts related to the current travel restrictions. Our last post was back in November 2020, but there have been several significant updates since then. This post will build on that post, rather than simply repeating the information found there.
The Canadian Government continually updates their website with the latest travel rules and this post breaks down some of the key highlights along with a commentary.
Who can leave Canada?
There seems to be so little news reports (CTV) on this matter, but I thought I’d bring it up. The short version of the story is that Canadians who are coming back to Canada and forced into a 14-day quarantine can potentially qualify for $500 per week (up to 2 weeks or $1,000) if they have lost wages.
The Canadian Government has lots of information regarding who is permitted to travel to and from Canada (along with exceptions). There seems to be a lot of information to sort through. But let’s dig a little deeper as we hope to demystify the whole “travel ban” in place.
We will avoid being political in this post. This post is suppose to be as neutral as possible, but also highlights open-ended questions for food for thought. Feel free to share your thoughts in the comment section below!
I was just reading an article from CBC: Airlines lure Canadians to buy tickets for flights that will never take off.
Flights Being Cancelled
The article is fairly long, but here is a quick summary of the point I would like to discuss today. Basically, passengers are complaining that Canadian airlines are selling tickets for scheduled flights, but the flights never actually take off. So when the flight gets cancelled, the passenger has little option to reschedule, so they end up being stuck with a flight voucher, instead of a cash refund. And there is little chance that the passenger will ever be able to use the flight voucher.
The Canada and US border crossing ban (for non-essential travel) began March 21, 2020 was set to expire on June 21, 2020. It has now been extended to July 21, 2020.
This has been a topic that has gone on for a while, but I have yet to chime in on this. I thought this was as good a time as any, since it has been dragging out.
Yesterday, CBC reported that the Canadian Transportation Agency (CTA) said that “airlines are not required to refund passengers for flights cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic or other reasons outside an airline’s control.”
So there we have it. It will be up to the airlines to decide whether they want to refund passengers or not for a cancelled flight. I thought I’d share my pros and cons from each perspective and offer a possible compromise solution.
I am writing this post as I am listening to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau making his announcement that all travellers who are not Canadian citizens or permanent residents will not be allowed entry into Canada. The exceptions include: U.S. citizens, diplomats, crew and immediate family members of citizens.
Today’s post was triggered when I read about a Canadian confirmed with coronavirus on a cruise ship. As of today, over 900 deaths and 40,000 confirmed cases, which probably means there are more that we do not know about. It really feels like this is spiking at an accelerated rate. So I thought I’d put together a post on how to protected ourselves.
Keep in mind that we already wrote a post about checking your flights to China, as they are most likely cancelled by now.
Note that most of the content below is gathered from the Canadian Government’s website (stay up to date here too), but I thought I’d provide a cheat sheet as there is so much information to sort through.