Today, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services issued an updated version of the M-274 I-9 Handbook for Employers. The updates follow the changes that resulted from the release of the revised I-9 Form on January 31, 2020. It also includes additional guidance for commonly asked questions and issues raised by employers.
The M-274 is the “go-to” manual for questions regarding I-9 completion and its continued updates are an extremely helpful way for the regulatory agencies to ensure that employers have a needed tool for successful completion of the required forms.
Notable Updates to the Handbook include the following:
Proper completion of I-9 forms is not intuitive and due to the various federal, state and local government documents that may be used, continual refresher training should be provided for personnel who are assigned this responsibility. As Guidepost often notes in I-9 training provided to clients, “the I-9 Form is a two-page form that has a 96-page user manual.”
With the complexity of I-9 compliance programs, as well as continued I-9 compliance enforcement by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Guidepost offers a range of services for employers to build, assess, and remediate compliance programs to ensure compliance with all relevant laws. We have assisted companies from Fortune 500 to local independent companies with their I-9 concerns.
As a reminder to all employers, the new I-9 form (version 10/21/2019), becomes mandatory on May 1, 2020 and prior versions can no longer be used.