USCIS Posts Notice Clarifying Three-Day Rule for Employee Eligibility Verification for New Hires

09 Jul 2010

USCIS recently reminded U.S. employers that they have just three days after their new employees’ dates of hire to open a case in E-Verify. In addition, this rule also applies to the completion of essential portions of the I-9 form. Section 2 of the I-9 form should also be completed within this time period. It should be noted, for clarification, that the three-day period is, in fact, four total days, as stated in a USCIS posting. For example, if an employee is hired on a Monday, these deadlines must be reached by the Thursday of that same week. The date of hire (in this case, Monday) is not counted in the three-day period.

However, there has been some question as to whether ICE will interpret the three-day rule in the same way that USCIS has stated. While ICE has informed the public that they will honor the USCIS interpretation of the three-day rule (the fourth day after a hire), ICE has not published any official notice stating this understanding and has, instead, only forwarded the USCIS posting to their field agents.