Today is the old new Form I-9 deadline

Remember the Form I-9 “Hokey Pokey” we played last summer? Are you ready for round two?

A new I-9 form was scheduled to take effect today, but in a surprise move, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) retracted the mandatory changes late on Friday, January 30, pending further comment and review.

I hope you remember where you put your old I-9s, because DHS says we must continue using them until April 3, 2009. The good version of the Form I-9 should have the “(Rev. 06/05/07) N” date on the bottom right-hand corner of the form.

Last Friday, DHS extended another 30-day comment period for the new Employment Verification rules and pushed back the scheduled update by two months, instructing businesses to go back to using the previous guidelines and I-9 forms.

In preparation for the new I-9 forms, many hiring managers and HR departments across the country discarded the previous forms, believing them to be outdated. The retraction and re-instatement of the old forms has some employers scrambling to respond and replace the forms they threw out last week.

Ashley Kaplan, Labor Law Compliance Attorney for G.Neil, received the DHS announcement Friday evening and immediately recognized the potential challenges.

“We worked overtime last week to ship out the updated forms to our customers to begin using on February 2, and now need to get back to them with new instructions,” Kaplan explains. “We’re providing a free pdf of the previous I-9 Form and instructions to our customers who purchased the updated forms. We’ll also closely monitor the extended review period in case further changes occur before the April 3rd deadline.”

If there was ever a time when procrastinating on compliance deadlines could work in your favor - this was it. You now have more time to get the right forms in order and finish up that Form I-9 training.

Still confused and need more information? Read G.Neil's new Form I-9 Q & A.

Are your employees trained on the new Form I-9?

U.S. employers have less than a month to ensure their organizations are in compliance with the new changes to the Employment Eligibility Verification process (Form I-9).

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) published the new I-9 changes to streamline the work eligibility process on December 17, 2008. The new I-9 form reflects several changes including new employment verification guidelines and a redefined list of acceptable proof of identification documents.

Beginning February 2, 2009, all employers are required to use the revised Form I-9 for verification of new employees and re-verification of existing employees. It is each employer’s responsibility to ensure all employees involved in the hiring process are trained on the latest changes to the new document.

The new Form I-9 includes several modifications that you should cover in your Form I-9 compliance training, including:

• Using expired documents as proof of identification or work authorization is no longer acceptable.
• Three documents were eliminated from List A of the List of Acceptable Documents: Temporary Resident Card, and older versions of the Employment Authorization Card/Document.
• Foreign passports with machine-readable visas for certain citizens of the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM) and the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) were added to List A.
• The new U.S. Passport card was added to the list of acceptable employment eligibility verification documents.
• Revisions to the employee attestation section of the Form I-9.

Employers who fail to use the revised I-9 form by February 2, 2009 may be subject to violation fines. Keep your company in compliance by ordering the updated Form I-9 today.

Changes to the I-9 form -- new training needed?

Today's statement on the USCIS government website indicated that the current I-9 form is no longer valid, effective immediately.

But before you start reading over the new form, looking for the changes, planning the new I-9 directions in the handbook, and the new verification process for new hires, take a deep breath.

I am going to walk you through the changes. Now. Here.

1) At the top of the I-9 form and its accompanying instruction form is a date. Your copy probably says "Expires 06/30/08." The new form says (are you ready?) "Expires 06/30/09"

2) At the bottom of the two forms, yours most likely says " Rev. 06-05-07." The new form says "Rev. 06/16/08."

That's it.

There are no other changes. According to the government's web site, the only new training you will need to do is to train someone to throw away the old forms immediately, and order new forms right away. The old otherwise identical forms are no longer valid.

This kind of reads like a Friday Funny. The saddest part is, it's not.