Crimcheck and E-Verify will work with you to instantly determine a candidate’s legal right to work in the United States.
Crimcheck has partnered with industry leaders to offer a program that manages your employee I-9 forms. This system will allow you to electronically verify an individual’s name, date of birth and social security number, along with immigration information for non-citizens, against Federal databases in order to verify identity and employment eligibility of both citizen and non-citizen new hires.
Per E-Verify search rules, candidates must be run post-hire within three (3) days of hire through the E-Verify system.
Crimcheck will help you manage an e-verify search and questionable cases to a conclusive ending.
- 24/7 Accessibility: Conveniently process from anywhere at anytime with the E-Verify module.
- Ensure Compliance: Verifies the data at the Social Security Administration (SSA) and Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
- Reduce Errors: The electronic program will prompt to correct any data omission, data entry errors and exclusion of signature or date.
- Increase Tracking Efficiencies: Electronic system creates an easy environment to track expiration dates and generate reminder notifications for documentation renewal.
- Get Running Fast: Most clients are able to get up and running in less than 1 day!
I-9 Forms
The I-9 form, or Employment Eligibility Verification, is a form for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) document used by an employer to verify an employee’s identity and employment eligibility in the United States. The federal government supplies this form so that employers can complete at the time of hire.
The employee must also provide documentation which verifies their identity and legal authorization to accept employment in the U.S. Every employee must complete the I-9 at the time of hire. As of October 2004, the I-9 form can be completed electronically.
Employers must keep their current employees I-9 forms. They also must retain them for three years after hire date or one year after employment end date.
U.S. citizens I-9 forms are always valid unless a break in employment occurs for more than a year.
Please note, the I-9 form is not required for contractors or volunteers, however, if a company (company A) contracts work to another company (Company B) and Company B knowingly employs unauthorized workers, Company A could be liable.
Revised and Updated I-9 Forms
On March 8, 2013 U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services updated their electronic I-9 Forms. Employers should begin using this updated form immediately; however they can still use the former I-9 Form for up to 60 days, until May 7, 2013. Employers do not need to complete the revised form for employees who had completed the old form, as long as it was properly completed the first time around and is still on file with the employer.
USCIS updated the I-9 Form to reduce errors and there are several key revisions including:
- Additional data fields
- Clearer and more detailed completion instructions for both the employer and the employee
- Altered the lay out of the I-9 Form, including the expansion to two pages that must be filled out by the employer and employee
The revised and updated I-9 Form is available as a related download.
What Is The I-9 Process?
Employee must complete Section 1 of the I-9 form at the time of hire. The employer must complete Section 2 of the I-9 form within three days of the employee beginning work.
Documentation: The employee must provide documentation which verifies their identity and eligibility for employment in the U.S. The employee can provide one document (from List A) which verifies both identity and employment eligibility, or two different document; one which verified identity (from List B) and one which verifies employment eligibility (from List C). Those documents can be:
List A Documents
Documents that Establish Both identity and Employment Authorization:
- U.S. Passport or U.S. Passport Card
- Form I-551, Permanent Resident Card or Alien Registration Receipt Card
- Form I-766, Employment Authorization Document Card
- Foreign passport with Form I-94 or Form I-94A with Arrival-Departure Record, and containing an endorsement to work
- Passport from the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM) or the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) with Form I-94 or Form I-94A
- Foreign passport containing a Form I-551 stamp or Form I-551 printed notation
List B Documents
Documents that Establish Identity:
- Driver’s License
- ID card issued by federal, state or local government agencies or entities, provided it contains a photograph or information such as name, date of birth, gender, height, eye color and address
- School ID card with a photograph
- Voter registration card
- U.S.military card or draft record
- Military dependent’s ID card
- U.S.Coast Guard Merchant Mariner Document (MMD) card
- Native American tribal document
- Driver’s license issued by a Canadian government authority
Acceptable List B Documents for individuals under the age of 18 who are unable to present a document listed above:
- School record or report card
- Clinic, doctor or hospital record
- Day care or nursery school record
For minors under the age of 18 and certain individuals with disabilities who are unable to produce any of the listed identity documents, special notations may be used in place of a List B document.
List C Documents
Documents that Only Establish Employment Authorization:
- U.S. Social Security account number card that is unrestricted. U.S. Social Security account number card that is unrestricted. A card that includes any of the following restrictive wording is not an acceptable List C document:
- NOT VALID FOR EMPLOYMENT
- VALID FOR WORK ONLY WITH INS AUTHORIZATION
- VALID FOR WORK ONLY WITH DHS AUTHORIZATION
- Form FS-240, Consular Report of Birth Abroad
- Form FS-545, Certification of Birth Abroad issued by the U.S. Department of State
- Form DS-1350, Certification of Report of Birth issued by the U.S. Department of State
- Original or certified copy of a birth certificate issued by a state, county, municipal authority or outlying territory of the United States bearing an official seal
- Native American tribal document
- Form I-197, U.S. Citizen ID Card
- Form I-179, Identification Card for Use of Resident Citizen in the United States
- Employment authorization document issued by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Some employment authorization documents issued by DHS include but are not limited to:
- Form I-94 Arrival/Departure Record issued to asylees or work-authorized nonimmigrants (for example, H-1B nonimmigrants) because of their immigration status
- Form I-571, Refugee Travel Document
- An unexpired Form I-327
- Reentry Permit
- Form N-560
- Certificate of U.S. Citizenship or Form N-561
- Replacement Certificate of Citizenship (PDF, 40.3 KB)
- Form N-550
- Certificate of Naturalization or Form N-570
- Replacement Certificate of Naturalization (PDF, 176.3 KB).
- A Form I-797 issued to a conditional resident may be an acceptable List C document in combination with his or her expired Form I-551.
What Are I-9 Non-Compliance Penalties?
If an employer or employee choose to disobey I-9 compliance, there are penalties set forth by the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA). Federal law provides imprisonment and fines for the use of false documentation or false statements and for employers who hires unauthorized workers.
The fine for an employer can be between $250 and $5,500 per worker, and the may also be banned from any federal government contracts for up to a year. The employee may also be criminally prosecuted under immigration laws if they knowingly accept this fraudulent documentation.
If an employer fails to keep I-9 forms for the mandated time, they can be fined $110 per missing item. The employer can still be penalized even if the employee is legally authorized to work in the U.S.
For the employee, if they knowingly commit or participate in documentation fraud, they can be fines between $375 and $3,200 per document for the first offense. For the second and any subsequent offenses, the fine per document is between $3,200 and $6,500.
I-9 Anti-Discrimination
Along with the I-9 Form, the Immigration Reform and Control Act also included anti-discrimination provisions which mandates that a person who is legally allowed to work in the U.S. cannot be discriminated against on national origin or citizenship status in both hiring and termination. Also included is the provision which requires the standardized compliance of I-9 enforcement, meaning every employee must complete the I-9 before employment starts, no matter the circumstance. These provisions are enforced by the Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices (OSC).
What are the Types of Discrimination?
Citizenship or Immigration Status Discrimination – Employers may not treat employees differently due to the fact that they are or are not U.S. citizens or work authorized individuals. This includes citizens, recent permanent residents, temporary residents and refugees.
National Origin Discrimination – Employers may not treat employees differently because of their birth place, country of origin, ancestry, native language or accent. This can turn into an issue with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
Unfair Documentary Practices – When verifying employment eligibility, an employer may not request more than the necessary documents from the employee. The employer may also not deny reasonably genuine looking documents or request additional documents for the purpose of discrimination.
Retaliation – Any individual may not be discriminated against because they have filed charges with the OSC, cooperated with an OSC investigation, contested any unfair documentary actions or discrimination based on their national origin or other anti-discrimination provisions which are protected.
E-Verify Search Results
E-Verify is an internet based program which compares an employee’s employment eligibility Verification form (I-9) against data with the U.S. government. The E-Verify program is managed by the Department of Homeland Security and the Social Security Administration.
The E-Verify program is important because it has been reported that 5% of E-Verify inquiries are identified as “not authorized to work” and the results of the program are 99.5% accurate.
According to the Department of Homeland Security, more than 353,000 use E-Verify for hiring.
The program was launched in 1997 titled the Basic Pilot Program which was started to prevent illegal aliens from getting jobs in the U.S. Since the electronic storage of I-9 Forms, E-Verify was able to come about.
What is the E-Verify Process?
By law, every employer must complete the I-9 Form for all employees and although the I-9 Form and E-Verify are closely linked, E-verify is not necessary for enrolled employers to use.
When an employee is hired, the employer and employee must complete the I-9 Form. Within three days of the employee starting work, the employer enters the information on the I-9 into E-Verify. E-Verify then compares the entered information against government records for a result.
If an employee’s information matches, they are authorized and eligible to work in the U.S. If the information does not match, the employer is alerted. The employee then has eight business days to resolve any mismatched information. The employee is allowed to continue to work while they are resolving the problem.
In 2007, E-Verify began working with the federal immigration authorities to include biometric data, including photographs, to improve searches.
Please note, if required, E-Verify must be ran within 3 days of the employee’s start date.
Who Needs E-Verify?
Unlike I-9 forms, there is no federal law mandating the use of E-Verify searches for employees, however there are certain groups that must use it.
All federal government agencies must use E-Verify. Furthermore, all employers with federal contracts or subcontracts must also use E-Verify to verify not only the employment eligibility of their employees who directly work under those federal contracts but also for every new hire, whether or not they will be directly working with the federal contracts or subcontracts.
Terms to Know
An individual can be a citizen based on one or more of these factors: both parents are citizens, an individual was born in that country, an individuals marries a citizen or naturalization.
Cabinet department of the U.S. government which protects Americans from terrorist attacks, man-made accidents and natural disasters.
Another name for the I-9 Form
Citizenship which is granted to an immigrant after they have resided in that country for a certain number of years.
Generally, if the employee’s information matches, the employee’s case receives an Employment Authorized result in E-Verify. If the information does not match, the case will receive a Tentative Nonconfirmation (TNC) result and the employer must give the employee an opportunity to take action to resolve the mismatch. More details can be found here.
Frequently Asked Questions
When creating an E-Verify case you must enter all other last names used that the employee provided on their Form I-9. If the employee leaves the Other Last Names Used field blank, select the check box attesting that no other last names were provided on the employee’s Form I-9.
No, E-Verify employers may only accept List B identity documents that contain a photograph.
You may edit case information before submitting the case. If you submit a case and the information entered does not immediately match SSA and/or DHS records, the Review Case – Are You Sure? alert screen appears. From this screen, you can correct the employee’s first day of employment and confirm case information.
You can correct information before submitting the case by selecting the Edit Case Details button. If you need more time to verify the information is correct, you may click Save & Exit to exit the case. You can locate the case later under View/Search Cases.
You can also use the Close Case link at the bottom of the review page to close the case without submitting it. Then create a new case with the correct information.
If you submit a case and the information entered does not immediately match SSA and/or DHS records, the Review Case – Are You Sure? screen appears. From this screen you can correct and confirm case information.
If a case resulted in a tentative nonconfirmation (TNC) because incorrect information was entered, select the statement Employee will not take action to resolve this case and you will have the option to close the case due to incorrect data. After closing the case, create a new case with the correct information.
Please note, an employer cannot edit Section 1 of the Form I-9 completed by the employee. If there is incorrect information on Section 1, please send a new Applicant Link request.
You may receive a Case Incomplete status if you fail to take action on the Review Case – Are You Sure? alert screen or during photo matching.
If you have a case that is incomplete, you should access the case and continue the process.
To remove the Open Cases to be Closed case alert, close your open cases.
To remove the Cases with New Updates case alert, take the next required step for each case, for example by notifying the employee of a tentative nonconfirmation or closing the case.
To remove the Work Authorization Docs Expiring case alert, click Dismiss Alert.
You must notify your employee of their TNC result as soon as possible. You must also inform your employee that they must tell you whether they will take action on their TNC by the 10th day after E-Verify issued the TNC.
Once you have received your employee’s decision on whether they will take action on their TNC, you must confirm the employee’s decision by selecting the appropriate box in E-Verify and refer the case or close the case. You must complete these steps by the 10th federal government working day after issuance of the E-Verify TNC.
Once you refer to TNC case, the employee must visit a Social Security Administration (SSA) field office or contact the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) within eight federal government workdays to take action on their TNC. The employee’s Referral Date Confirmation provides the date by which the employee must visit SSA and/or contact DHS.
For more information on how to take action on a TNC, refer to the Referral Date Confirmation Notice or visit our How to Correct a Tentative Nonconfirmation page.
No, E-Verify is an Internet-based system that compares the information a participating employer enters from an employee’s Form I-9 with SSA and DHS records to electronically verify the newly hired employee’s employment eligibility. E-Verify does not share an employee’s immigration status with an employer: Employers will only see the employee’s employment eligibility status.
Employers should create a case for an F-1 student as they would for any other employee. As long as the employee and employer have completed the Form I-9 with acceptable documentation, the employer will have all the necessary information to create a case in E-Verify.
Individuals from American Samoa should only complete Form I-9 if they are working in the United States. For employment eligibility verification purposes the “United States” is defined in the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) as the continental United States (including the District of Columbia), Alaska, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. Although American Samoa is a U.S. territory, it is not included in this definition, and is subject to its own territorial immigration laws rather than the INA .
Individuals from American Samoa are generally noncitizen U.S. nationals and if so, and they work in the United States, they should indicate on Form I-9, Section 1 that they are noncitizen nationals. Noncitizen nationals are persons born in American Samoa, certain former citizens of the former Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, and certain children of noncitizen nationals born abroad. Employees from American Samoa working in the United States may present the same documentation as U.S. citizens for completion of Section 2.
