US and UK Citizens going for trip into US

So when I married my UK citizen wife, we went up to Vancouver, Canada the same night, and came back 2 days later into the US, and they were really weird about letting my wife in (US side) with me, they kept telling me because she didnt have a visa she wasnt allowed to enter, but we kept explaining that she was just going to Seattle to return back to London.

Does that happen a lot? We are planning on going to the US in November, but is she technically supposed to have a Visa first?

No, she does not need a visa unless you are planning to STAY in the US.  For a holiday, she can enter on the visa waiver programme.  My UK DH has done this loads of times with no trouble at all.

Oh, US immigration is very weird about visa waiver folks popping over the border to Canada and coming back across again later.  It is similiar to CTA problems we have here.  I suspect that she didn't surrender her I-94 to US Immigration when you went to Canada, meaning that didn't have a fix point in time when she left.  Technically she was trying to get another visa waiver at the same time of being on an already existing visa waiver...

I totally forgot about this when my partner and I visited Canada and was worried about a hassle on the way back, but this was before Sept 11th and the two Canadians in the car in front of me at the border crossing didn't realise you have to show ID at the border (DUH) and had to rummage around in their luggage.  The Border Agent was so frustrated with them that when she saw my Illinois plates on my car she just waved me (and my technically illegal Brit) across the border.

Don't forget the on-line registration thingy.

Vicky

Don't forget the on-line registration thingy.

Vicky

What online registration thingy?

https://esta.cbp.dhs.gov/esta/esta.html?_flowExecutionKey=_cCC919D1F-E272-C383-DB6F-A8607361BE0A_kF1984CB7-AB95-F2F7-B3C3-7265D8C13854

https://esta.cbp.dhs.gov/esta/esta.html?_flowExecutionKey=_cCC919D1F-E272-C383-DB6F-A8607361BE0A_kF1984CB7-AB95-F2F7-B3C3-7265D8C13854

when did that start?

when did that start?

they started taking registrations last august, but it became mandatory for non-US citizens traveling on Visa Waiver in January.