I-9 Storage: Don’t Get Burned!
19th August 2011 · 0 Comments
If you’ve been hiring employees for any period of time, you know that you must collect a completed I-9 form from each employee within three days of hiring. You may not realize, however, that if you knowingly allow a phony Social security number or other ID tidbit to go uncorrected, both you and the offending employee may have to face the music.
No good deed goes unpunished.
While the Texas Workforce Commission recommends keeping copies of the documents that are provided with I-9s, there is some risk.
If an employee submits a fraudulent ID with their I-9 (it’s not your fault and you’re not responsible for confirming the legality of that identification. After all, you’re an HR department and not a detective agency) and you’ve kept copies with all of your documentation, and ICE finds that piece of fraud sitting there, you’ve passively complied with the falsehood (assuming you’ve done nothing to report it) and your company may be hit with penalties, even though the employee is the one breaking the law.
This is an actual Drivers Licence from a traffic stop
What can you do to prevent this bleak scenario? Start by examining how you store incoming I-9s. You should be filing and storing them in a separate location from the personnel files, because they include information on sex, ethnicity and other factors that tend to leave employers open to discrimination lawsuits. A simple pre-emptive audit can also help you clean up your situation before ICE swoops in. Acadia HR can advise you on the proper procedures for straightening out your I-9 storage situation once and for all – before the authorities straighten it out for you, and you along with it.
It’s also important that the I-9’s be signed by a company representative as the witness.
In summary, the implications of improper documentation filing could result in an $1100 fine per incorrectly audited I-9, and with over 2800 audits this year by ICE alone, and another 1000 projected by the end of the year, it would be smart to perform quick audit of your documentation before ICE comes knocking at your door.
Contact us and we’ll be happy to go over the details with you.
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