Reminder: Employers Should Be Using Updated Form I-9s For New Hires in 2017

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Remember to use the new Form I-9!  In case you missed the announcement, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”) published an updated Form I-9 that all employers in the United States must use, effective January 22, 2017.  The prior version is now invalid and should not be used.  While the new Form I-9 looks very similar to the previous version, it does contain several substantive changes as well as “smart features” that were previously unavailable. The new Form I-9 can be found on the USCIS website. 

With regard to the content of the new Form I-9, the changes are readily apparent in the instructions, which increased from six pages to fifteen pages.  Within the actual form, employers will see five notable changes in Section 1.  First, the “Other Names Used” field has been replaced with an “Other Last Names Used” field.  Second, employees must now indicate whether an Alien Registration Number (if provided) is an A-number or a USCIS number.  Third, foreign nationals authorized to work in the U.S. are only required to provide one of the following in the new form: foreign passport information, Form I-94 admission number or alien registration number; the prior form required both an I-94 number and foreign passport information.  Fourth, up to five preparers and/or translators can now sign and date the form as the prior form only provided one space for preparers or translators.  Even if the employee did not use a preparer or translator, he/she will now have to indicate that no preparer or translator was used.  Finally, employees must now enter “N/A” in any fields that they previously would have left blank.

 USCIS also added new fields to Section 2 of the form.  The first new field is titled “Citizenship/Immigration Status,” and requires employers to indicate the citizenship status of the employee based on the employee’s answers in Section 1.  Finally, an “Additional Information” box has been added to Section 2 to allow employers to provide additional information, which had to be noted in the margins with the prior Form I-9. 

While Section 3 regarding re-verification has not changed, employers should remember that any re-verifications occurring after January 22, 2017 must be completed using the revised form.

The new “smart features” of the revised Form I-9 are designed to reduce error and include drop-down menus, hover text, auto-fill features, and real-time error notifications.  Notably, the new form also automatically generates a “QR Code” that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement auditors will utilize. (We note that the smart features initially were subject to, in the words of USCIS, a "glitch."  The version of the form first published on November 14, 2016 incorporated a technical error that caused the employee's Social Security number to be printed with transposed numbers when it was printed for signature.  USCIS quickly discovered the problem and issued a corrected version of the form on November 17, 2016.  It may be that not everyone knows of this error, as USCIS just recently posted a reminder on its website on April 6, 2017 about the error and how to correct it.  So, if your organization was an early adopter of the form, you should check to make sure you are using the corrected, "glitch-free" version. )

While the new Form I-9 is designed to be completed online (and then printed for signatures), employers still have the option of printing the form and filling it out manually.  Moreover, employers also have the option of using an electronic I-9 vendor.

 As a final point, the publication of the new form does not require employers to go back and update I-9s of employees verified prior to January 22, 2017 using the old form.  However, the failure to use the new Form I-9 after that date for new employees exposes employers to penalties of up to $2,156 for each form.

By:  John E. Pueschel and Patricia I. Heyen

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