The U.S. Government is Open!
On October 17th, 2013, the U.S. Government reopened. Now that the shutdown is over, human resource professionals need to know how the new startup process will work when ordering employment verification searches. These searches are performed by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) and Social Security Administration (SSA).
The USCIS has published the following statement in reference to E-Verify Availability:
E-Verify has resumed operations following the federal government shutdown. All E-Verify features and services are now available.
Information for Employers
Form I-9
The Form I-9 requirements were not affected during the federal government shutdown. All employers must complete a Form I-9 for every person hired to work for pay in the United States during the shutdown.
E-Verify
Employees who received a Tentative Nonconfirmation (TNC)
If an employee had a TNC referred between September 17, 2013, and September 30, 2013, and was not able to resolve the TNC due to the federal government shutdown, add 12 federal business days to the date printed on the ‘Referral Letter’ or ‘Referral Date Confirmation.’ Employees have to this new date to contact the Social Security Administration (SSA) or the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to resolve their cases. If you have an employee who decided to contest his or her TNC while E-Verify was unavailable, you should now initiate the referral process in E-Verify. Employers may not take any adverse action against an employee because of a TNC.
Employees who received an SSA Final Nonconfirmation (FNC) or DHS No Show result
If an employee received a Final Nonconfirmation (FNC) or No Show because of the federal government shutdown, please close the case and select “The employee continues to work for the employer after receiving a Final Nonconfirmation result,” or “The employee continues to work for the employer after receiving a No Show result.” The employer must then enter a new case in E-Verify for that employee. These steps are necessary to ensure the employee is afforded the opportunity to timely contest and resolve the Tentative Nonconfirmation (TNC) that led to the FNC result.
Creating Cases: Three-Day Rule
You must create an E-Verify case for each employee hired during or otherwise affected by the shutdown by November 5, 2013. If you are prompted to provide a reason why the case is late (i.e., does not conform to the three-day rule), select ‘Other’ from the drop-down list of reasons and enter ‘federal government shutdown’ in the field.
Federal Contractor Deadlines
During the federal government shutdown, federal contractors could not enroll or use E-Verify as required by the federal contractor rule. Your organization might have missed a deadline because E-Verify was unavailable or it has an upcoming deadline for complying with the federal contractor rule. Please follow the instructions above and notify your contracting officer of these instructions.
CBSV Searches
The integrated process for the Consent Based Social Security Verification system provided by the Social Security Administration is currently unavailable. The SSA has provided an estimated restart date of October 21, 2013.
How will the shut down affect my order process with Justifacts?
Justifacts is currently processing E-Verify orders to the USCIS. All orders that were sent to Justifacts between September 30th and October 17th will be processed and completed by the end of the business day. CBSV employment verification searches are delayed. These searches will be processed as soon as the SSA Web Services team has the system up and running. Justifacts will be checking the system periodically in case of an unannounced restart.
Justifacts will continue to provide necessary updates about the shutdown once they are available.
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