I-9 and E-Verify: The Hiring Forms You Cannot Skip

“Do I need E-Verify for a three-man crew?” The question mixes two different things. Form I-9 is required for every employee you hire, whether you have one or a hundred. E-Verify, the online check that compares the I-9 against government records, is voluntary under federal law, but some states require it, and some, such as Arizona and South Carolina, require it of every employer. So for a three-man crew the I-9 is always yes, and E-Verify depends on your state.

Hiring your first employee puts the I-9 in order with the rest of the new-hire paperwork. This article goes further into the form itself, the documents, what mistakes cost, and the state E-Verify rules.

Who needs an I-9

USCIS puts it plainly: “You must complete Form I-9 each time you hire any person to perform labor or services in the United States in return for wages or other remuneration.” There is no small-business exception. The handbook lists the people you do not complete one for, and three matter to contractors: independent contractors; workers employed by a contractor providing contract services, such as an employee-leasing or temporary agency; and people employed for casual domestic work in a private home on a sporadic, irregular or intermittent basis.

The independent-contractor line is narrower than it sounds. Calling a helper a subcontractor does not make him one; 1099 or W-2 covers how the tests work. And USCIS adds a warning that applies either way: “You cannot hire an individual who you know is not authorized to work in the United States.”

The two deadlines

Section 1 is the employee’s, by the first day of work (any time after accepting the offer); Section 2 is yours, within three business days of the day work begins, or on the first day for a job shorter than that. The first-employee article linked above walks through USCIS’s Monday-to-Thursday example. Use the current form from USCIS’s Form I-9 page. You do not send it anywhere: USCIS says not to file it with USCIS or ICE. You keep it.

The documents: the employee chooses

The employee shows either one document from List A, which proves both identity and work authorization (a U.S. passport or passport card, or a Permanent Resident Card, for example), or one from List B plus one from List C. List B proves identity, such as a state driver’s license with a photo or identifying details. List C proves work authorization, such as an unrestricted Social Security card or a birth certificate issued by a U.S. state, county, municipal authority or territory with an official seal.

The rules that trip employers up:

• You may not ask for a particular document. “You cannot specify which documentation an employee will present from the Form I-9 Lists of Acceptable Documents.” “Bring your green card” is the mistake.
• Originals, in person. Unless you use the remote procedure below, you review the documents in the employee’s physical presence, and photocopies are not acceptable, except certified copies of birth certificates. You must accept a document that “reasonably appears to be genuine and relates to the person presenting it.”
• Copies are optional, but all or none. You may keep copies of the documents you reviewed, but if you do, USCIS says they “should be made consistently for all new hires and reverified employees, regardless of national origin, citizenship, or immigration status, or you may violate anti-discrimination laws.”
• Remote review is for E-Verify employers only. An employer that participates in E-Verify in good standing may examine copies of the documents over a live video call instead, keep clear copies of the front and back, and check the alternative-procedure box on the form. If you offer it at a site, you offer it consistently there, though you may limit it to remote hires.

Keeping the forms

Keep each I-9 for “three years after the date of hire, or one year after the date employment ends, whichever is later.” Say you hire a laborer on March 2, 2026 and he leaves in August 2026: keep the form until March 2, 2029. Say a foreman hired in 2019 leaves in June 2026: keep it until June 2027. Paper or electronic storage is fine, but you must be able to produce the forms within three business days of an inspection request from DHS, the Justice Department’s Immigrant and Employee Rights Section or the Department of Labor.

Some workers need reverifying when their work authorization expires; Supplement B of the form handles that, and rehires. Reverification is never required for U.S. citizens or noncitizen nationals, and never when a U.S. passport, passport card, Permanent Resident Card or List B document expires.

What a sloppy I-9 costs

Failing to complete, keep or produce the forms is a paperwork violation, separate from knowingly hiring someone not authorized to work. In its inflation adjustment effective January 2, 2025, DHS set the paperwork penalty at “not less than $288 and not more than $2,861 for each individual.” Those are still the amounts: the White House budget office cancelled every agency’s 2026 inflation adjustment because the October 2025 price data was never produced during the government shutdown (OMB Memorandum M-26-11, April 17, 2026). In setting the amount, DHS considers the size of the business, good faith, the seriousness of the violation, whether the worker was unauthorized, and past violations. A good-faith attempt to comply may be enough despite a technical error, unless you fail to correct it within 10 days of DHS telling you about it.

The arithmetic is per person. A crew of six with Section 2 never filled in is six violations: somewhere between 6 × $288 = $1,728 and 6 × $2,861 = $17,166 on the published range, before any question about the workers themselves.

E-Verify: what it is and what joining commits you to

E-Verify is “an Internet-based system that compares information entered by an employer from an employee’s Form I-9” with records available to DHS and the Social Security Administration. Its own site calls it free. The user manual sets out who must use it: “E-Verify is a voluntary program. However, employers with federal contracts or subcontracts that contain the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) E-Verify clause are required to enroll in and use E-Verify,” and employers in states whose laws require it, “for example, as a condition of business licensing,” may have to as well.

If you enroll, the rules come with it. The I-9 comes first, and the E-Verify case must be created “no later than the third business day after the employee starts work for pay.” You may not use it to pre-screen applicants. You create cases for all new hires, display the E-Verify participation and Right to Work posters in English and Spanish, and may not fire, suspend, cut the pay of or otherwise act against an employee because of a mismatch while he works it out.

States that require E-Verify of small employers

Two details from those laws. Florida’s fine for an employer that fails to use E-Verify three times in any 24-month period is $1,000 per day until it is fixed, and a subcontractor on a public job must give the contractor an affidavit that it does not employ, contract with or subcontract with an unauthorized alien. In South Carolina, a first violation for knowingly or intentionally employing an unauthorized alien means the employer’s licenses are suspended for 10 to 30 days (S.C. Code §41-8-50).

So, the three-man crew: in Arizona and South Carolina, E-Verify is required now. In Georgia, North Carolina and Florida it is not required at that size, though Georgia still wants the exemption affidavit with your business license and Florida requires it on any public-agency contract. Other states have E-Verify rules of their own, so check with your state’s labor department before your next hire.

General information, not legal or tax advice. Rules change and vary by state; check with the agency named above or a professional for your situation.