Visiting Collins Correctional Facility

Ask Him Which Group He Is In

This is the first thing to sort out, and the only place in this guide where the answer is not on any website.

NYSDOCCS states it on the schedule: weekend visits are divided into specific segments of the population by housing unit location. The dated calendar then marks each weekend day EVEN or ODD, and Saturday and Sunday of the same weekend go to different groups.

What that means in practice:

• A family gets one day of each weekend, not the choice of two.
• Which day depends on where he is housed, not on his name or his DIN.
• No search result will tell you this. The state lookup returns the facility and the DIN and stops there.

So the question to ask on the next call or in the next letter is this: which group are you, EVEN or ODD? Once you have that, the dated schedule on the NYSDOCCS Collins page gives you every date for the year.

If he moves housing unit, the answer can change, which is worth checking again after any move inside the prison.

Hours, and the 2:30 Line

Visits run 8:30 AM to 3:00 PM. The latest you can arrive is 2:30 PM.

The half hour between the cutoff and the close is not a late window. Arriving at 2:40 means no visit, even on a day that is unambiguously yours.

No Cap, Space Permitting

On a scheduled day that belongs to your group there is no limit on the number of visits, space permitting.

That last phrase is the department’s own. On a busy day the room can fill, so arriving earlier in the window is worth more here than the arrival cutoff alone suggests.

Three Visitors, and the Under Fives

Three visitors at a time, plus one child under the age of five, who does not count toward the three.

A child of five or older does count, so three adults and a six year old is a group of four and will not fit.

How a Visit Is Arranged

Nothing needs booking for a regular visit. Under NYSDOCCS rules you can visit during visiting hours with proper photo identification, as long as the person inside agrees to the visit.

On a first visit, staff take your photograph for the visitor identification system and you sign a statement agreeing to the visiting rules. Allow extra time on that trip.

Some visitors need advance written approval: people on probation or parole, NYSDOCCS staff, volunteers, contract workers, and anyone with past or pending criminal cases.

Children are straightforward. Their own children can visit without written permission where the parent’s name is on the birth certificate. A child under eighteen visiting without a parent or guardian needs the parent’s written permission.

The Free Bus

Collins is one of 18 New York prisons reached by a free roundtrip visitor bus, run in partnership with the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision.

It costs the family nothing. Collins sits in Erie County, in the southern part of the county, and Buffalo is about forty minutes away.

Seats are booked ahead, so confirm the housing group before you book one. A coach seat on the wrong day of the weekend is the same wasted trip as a car journey.

Getting to Collins

From	Approximate journey
Buffalo	About forty minutes
Rochester	About one hour and a half
Erie, PA	About one hour and a half
Syracuse	About three hours
New York City	About six and a half hours

The prison is on Middle Road at Collins.

What to Bring

Photo identification for everyone over sixteen, and the visit does not proceed without it.

Phones, bags and electronics stay in the car or on the coach.

If you are bringing money, the visitor lockbox takes $50 in cash a day in total, however many of you are visiting, and it takes money orders and checks as well.

On the Day That Is Not Yours

One day a weekend leaves six days without one, and that is what the post and the phone cover.

Calls from every New York state prison have been free since August 2025. Pigeonly sends letters and photos from your phone, addressed to P.O. Box 340 with the right ZIP, so the days between visits are not empty ones.