By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 13:54:00 +0000

I think clarification on your post is needed because many of your points are simply not accurate. In particular, the comment, “..90% accuracy for a database that will instantly label you a criminal and drop you from the potential employment pool, most likely without any feedback as to the source of your miseries?” is problematic and very misleading. As someone who works closely with E-Verify, I can attest that the program does not “instantly label you a criminal..” First,
there are many reasons as to why an employee’s information would cannot be confirmed immediately, including becomming a citizen and neglecting to update your information with the Social Security Administration, getting married and neglecting to update your information, etc. etc. In no way does the program make the assumption that the employee is not authorized to work in the U.S. or label the employee a ‘criminal.’ In fact, in most cases the initial non confirmation occurred because the employee neglected to update his or her own records.
Secondly, if the initial query does not result in a message stating the employee is work authorized, the employee has ample time to resolve the issue with either Social Security Administration or Dept of Homeland Security. In the majority of cases, the case is resolved within 24 hours. Since the employer is required to allow the employee to continue working during this timeframe, employees are not adversely affected whatsoever, other than being inconvenienced with going to the local Social Security office to update their records (which they are required to do regardless of whether their employer uses E-Verify).
Third, the employee does indeed receive ‘feedback’ on why E-Verify could not confirm his or her status – within seconds of the query, the program transmits a message stating either ‘work authorized’ or ‘tentative non-confirmation, SSA unable to confirm’ or ‘tentative non-confirmatin, DHS unable to confirm,’ and instructs the employee on how to resolve it. Thus, the employer instantly knows which agency was not able to verify employment authorization and provides the employee with this information so the employee can resolve the issue. I realize that many are not familiar with E-Verify, and as a result misconceptions abound, but I believe that one should know the facts before casting criticism, or he or she risks the unfortunate circumstance of making false claims.

Comments on: State of Illinois and Feds fight over Worker Verification Program

By: Anonymous