Employers are required to timely and properly complete and retain Form I-9 for each employee they hire. The first day of employment means the first day an employee works in exchange for wages or other remuneration. These Form I-9 requirements also apply to E-Verify employers. With the goal of ensuring a legal workforce, employers enrolled in E Verify have chosen to take the additional step of electronically confirming that information their employees provide match government records.

Newly hired employees must complete Section 1 of Form I-9 in its entirety on the first day of employment. They may complete Section 1 before this date, but only after acceptance of an offer of employment. Under general Form I-9 practice, employees can voluntarily provide their Social Security numbers (SSNs) on Form I-9. However, because SSNs are required for employers to create E-Verify cases, all employees whose employment eligibility will be verified in E-Verify must provide their SSNs.

If a newly hired employee has applied for, but has not yet received an SSN (for example, the employee is a newly arrived immigrant), attach an explanation to the employee’s Form I-9 and set it aside. Allow the employee to continue to work and create a case in E-Verify using the employee’s SSN as soon as it is available. If the case was not created by the third business day after the employee started work for pay, indicate the reason for this delay. Employers may choose a reason from the drop-down list or state a specific reason in the field provided.

Employers must complete Section 2 of Form I-9 in its entirety within three days of the employee’s date of hire. To complete Section 2, physically examine the documents presented by the employee in-person or remotely examine using  an alternative procedure authorized by the Secretary of Homeland Security to establish the employee’s identity and employment authorization. Do not specify which documents from the “Lists of Acceptable Documents” on Form I-9 the employee must present. Employers may reject a document if it does not reasonably appear to be genuine and to relate to the person presenting it.

Documents from List A establish both identity and employment eligibility. Documents from List B establish identity only and documents from List C establish employment eligibility only. Employers must accept either one document from List A, or a combination of one document from List B and one document from List C.

Any List B document presented to employers participating in E Verify must contain a photo. However, if an employee objects to providing a photo document for religious reasons, call E-Verify at 888-464-4218. If the employee presents a U.S. passport, a passport card, a Permanent Resident Card (Form I-551) or an Employment Authorization Document (Form I-766), the employer must obtain a copy of it and retain it with Form I 9. For more information on Form I-9 retention guidelines, refer to the Handbook for Employers: Guidance for Completing Form I-9 (M-274).