Preliminary Observations on Employment Verification and Worksite Enforcement Efforts

By General Accounting Office

Book Id: WPLBN0000219610
Format Type: PDF eBook
File Size: 0.1 MB
Reproduction Date: 2005

Title:	Preliminary Observations on Employment Verification and Worksite Enforcement Efforts
Author:	General Accounting Office
Volume:
Language:	English
Subject:	Government publications, Accountability in government, United States. General Accounting Office
Collections:	Government Library Collection, Government Accountability Integrity Reliability Office Collection
Historic Publication Date:
Publisher:	United States General Accounting Office (Gao)


Citation APA MLA Chicago Office, G. A. (n.d.). Preliminary Observations on Employment Verification and Worksite Enforcement Efforts. Retrieved from http://self.gutenberg.org/

Description
Government Accountability Integrity Reliability Office Collection

Excerpt
Excerpt: The current employment verification (Form I-9) process is based on employers? review of documents presented by new employees to prove their identity and work eligibility. On the Form I-9, employers certify that they have reviewed documents presented by their employees and that the documents appear genuine and relate to the individual presenting the documents. However, document fraud (use of counterfeit documents) and identity fraud (fraudulent use of valid documents or information belonging to others) have undermined the employment verification process by making it difficult for employers who want to comply with the process to ensure they hire only authorized workers and easier for unscrupulous employers to knowingly hire unauthorized workers. In addition, the number and variety of documents acceptable for proving work eligibility has hindered employer verifications efforts. In 1998, the former Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), now part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), proposed revising the Form I-9 process, particularly to reduce the number of acceptable work eligibility documents, but DHS has not yet finalized the proposal. The Basic Pilot Program, a voluntary program through which participating employers electronically verify employees? work eligibility, shows promise to enhance the current employment verification process, help reduce document fraud, and assist ICE in better targeting its worksite enforcement efforts. Yet, several current weaknesses in the pilot program?s implementation, such as its inability to detect identity fraud and DHS delays in entering data into its databases, could adversely affect increased use of the pilot program, if not addressed.