Entering Canada and Testing
Upon your entry to Canada by air or at a land border crossing, the border services officer may notify you that you have been randomly selected for a mandatory arrival test.
All travellers are strongly encouraged to pre-register for an on-arrival COVID-19 molecular test in advance of landing in Canada to avoid lengthy lines and delays in processing.
If you are randomly selected for a mandatory arrival test, you:
- must take the arrival test as directed on the day you enter Canada. The test may be administered at the airport or you may receive a self-swab kit at the airport or land border to complete within 24 hours after entering Canada
- can take connecting flights to your place of quarantine
- must quarantinein a suitable place while you await the arrival test result
- aren’t required to pay a fee for the arrival test
may leave quarantine when you get a negative arrival test result. If the test result is positive, you must isolate for a further 10 days
For more information, please visit the travel.gc.ca website.
Students must have a suitable quarantine plan in place in the event that they are selected for arrival testing. A suitable place of quarantine must meet the following conditions:
(a) it allows the person to avoid all contact with other people with whom they did not travel unless they are a minor, in which case the minor can have contact with other people who are providing care and support to the minor;
(b) it allows the person to avoid all contact with vulnerable persons or persons who provide care to those persons, unless the vulnerable person is a consenting adult or the parent, step-parent or dependent child in a parent-child relationship;
(c) it allows no other person to be present at the place, unless that person resides there habitually;
(d) it allows the person to have access to a bedroom at the place that is separate from the one used by persons who did not travel and enter Canada with that person;
(e) it allows the person to access the necessities of life without leaving that place; and
(f) it allows the person to avoid all contact with health care providers and persons who work or assist in a facility, home or workplace where vulnerable persons are present.
Students may use this tool to assess their quarantine plan.
Back-up quarantine plans available through the Study Safe Corridor
Students’ whose place of residence does not meet the requirements of a suitable place of quarantine may obtain a back-up quarantine plan through the Languages Canada Study Safe Corridor.
Students will be issued a back-up quarantine plan letter which contains all necessary information to input into the ArriveCan App prior to arrival in Canada. In the event that these students are randomly selected for arrival testing, they can then purchase a 3-day quarantine hotel and meal package through the SSC.
