Quote:
Originally Posted by G.Bledsoe
As long as your FM-T (tourist visa) is valid, you may cross the border multiple times with a temporary import permit for your car or light truck. The option is standing in line each time and paying the $36 USD fee. The lines are usually long on the weekends, too. We stood in line for 2 hours on a Friday night at 11:00 PM in October in Nuevo Laredo last year. (It is possible to obtain the permit and sticker by email, too.)
Yes, if your car--with the Mexican tourist sticker still on the windshield-- is destroyed while you are in the U.S., you must clear the sticker with the Banjercito. You may obtain a form from the Banjercito, take it to your local police to be signed--atesting to the fact--that your car has been destroyed, and return
the form to Mexico. (I am trying to get more information about this process.)
And, yes, having a tourist sticker on your car, while parked on a street in Laredo, might encourage someone to hotwire it and drive it into Mexico, but the ladron would still need identification to make the vehicle's permit at the 30K checkpoint.
Regardless, there may be gringos who live on the US side of the border who need to make frequent trips into the interior of Mexico and want to avoid waiting in line and the expense each time. These people should know that the temporary import permit may be used multiple times, as long as their tourist visa ihas not expired.
Clearly, if an American tourist does not plan to return to Mexico for an extended time, it is probably best that he/she stop at the border and have the sticker removed-----and their FM-T canceled.
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I now have copies of the forms to clear the temporary import permit and need to clarify what I said above. This process was followed by a friend of mine who did not have the permit and sticker on his Jaguar canceled when he left Mexico last October.
The necessary form is actually obtained from the Mexican Customs (Aduanas) offices in Mexico City. You then take the form down to your local police or state trooper office, and have them inspect your car, or attest to the fact that the car has been stolen or destroyed. Then you return the form and your documents, including the permit and sticker itself, to the Mexican Customs official in Mexico City. They will authorize the Banjercito to clear your vehicle out of their computer.
The only other option is to return to a Banjercito office at the border.