Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed Florida’s Senate Bill 1718 into law on May 10th, 2023. This bill has a broad purpose to obstruct the flow of illegal immigration in the state and imposes some of the toughest penalties in the country.
Private employers with 25 or more employees and public employers are now required to use the E-Verify system to verify employment eligibility of all new hires starting July 1, 2023.
Employers will have 30 days to cure noncompliance, and those that fail to verify their employees three times in a 24 month period will be fined $1,000 per day, until the employees are verified.
Enrollment in E-Verify is performed with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security on their website https://www.e-verify.gov/employers
If you are a PayMaster client, we have the ability to directly connect with E-Verify to simplify the verification process. Contact your payroll specialist for information.
E-Verify started as a pilot program in 1997 to help employers verify the work authorization of new hires. When you have an employee complete the Form I-9, you are taking the word of the employee and the face value of the documents they provide. E-Verify allows you to confirm the provided documentation against multiple government databases.
The Form I-9 must be completed for every new hire within three business days of the date the employee begins work. Employees must not begin the I-9 process until after the individual is hired, so it is suggested the I-9 is completed upon hire, and the E-Verify is performed BEFORE the employee starts to perform work. This way if there is a discrepancy found, it can be resolved before the employee performs work that could be considered illegal.
The employer enters the information provided on the I-9 form into the E-Verify system, where it is compared against about a half billion records in the Social Security Administration database and 80 million records in the Department of Homeland Security’s immigration database. Most inquiries are returned within 3 days. In the event of a non-confirmation notice, the employee must visit a SSA office or call DHS, and the employee has eight federal work-days to start resolving the case. Only about half of those who receive a non-confirmation notice contest it.
While the accuracy of the database has improved substantially, the error rate was too high for it to become a federally mandated program. Although, as of Sept. 8, 2009, federal contractors or subcontractors are required to use E-verify to determine employment eligibility of employees performing direct work on the contract and new hires.
Several states, which now include Florida have passed mandatory E-Verify laws that require businesses to confirm the eligibility of newly hired employees.
Here is a list of states that have some variation of mandating E-Verify.
- Alabama: All employers are required to use E-Verify.
- Arizona: All employers are required to use E-Verify.
- Arkansas: All employers with four or more employees are required to use E-Verify.
- Colorado: All employers with one or more employees are required to use E-Verify.
- Florida: Effective July 1, 2023, private employers with 25 or more employees and public employers.
- Georgia: All employers with one or more employees are required to use E-Verify.
- Idaho: All employers are required to use E-Verify.
- Indiana: All employers with more than one employee and who are not exempt are required to use E-Verify.
- Iowa: All employers with four or more employees are required to use E-Verify.
- Kansas: All employers are required to use E-Verify.
- Louisiana: All employers with one or more employees are required to use E-Verify.
- Michigan: All state contractors and subcontractors are required to use E-Verify.
- Mississippi: All employers are required to use E-Verify.
- Missouri: All public employers and employers with contracts with public entities are required to use E-Verify.
- Nebraska: All employers with one or more employees are required to use E-Verify.
- North Carolina: All employers with more than 25 employees are required to use E-Verify.
- North Dakota: All public employers are required to use E-Verify.
- Oklahoma: All employers with one or more employees are required to use E-Verify.
- Pennsylvania: All public employers and all employers with contracts with public entities are required to use E-Verify.
- South Carolina: All employers are required to use E-Verify.
- Tennessee: All employers with six or more employees are required to use E-Verify.
- Texas: All employers are required to use E-Verify.
- Utah: All employers are required to use E-Verify.
- Virginia: All state agencies and public contractors are required to use E-Verify.
- West Virginia: All employers with five or more employees are required to use E-Verify.
- Wisconsin: All public contractors and subcontractors are required to use E-Verify.
- Wyoming: All state contractors and subcontractors are required to use E-Verify.
June is Alzheimer’s and Brain Awareness Month
More than 55 million people are living with Alzheimer’s or other types of dementia world wide. Dementia isn’t a single disease; it’s an overall term that covers a wide range of specific medical conditions, including Alzheimer’s. Since 2000, deaths from heart disease have decreased by 14% while deaths from Alzheimer’s disease has increased by 89%. Help bring awareness by wearing Purple in June!Learn More
Beginning June 1, 2023, employers in Florida are prohibited from doing any of the following:
- Basing any employment decision on documentation of vaccination if the vaccination is for COVID-19 or uses mRNA technology
- Basing any employment decision on the knowledge or a belief about a person’s COVID-19 vaccination status or their receipt of any mRNA vaccine, or their COVID-19 post-infection recovery status
- Requiring COVID-19 testing
- Basing any employment decision on a person’s failure to take a COVID-19 test
- Require employees to wear face coverings that cover their mouth and nose, with exceptions for healthcare providers and when face coverings are a standard occupational safety measure.
The following are recent and anticipated changes to U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) workplace posters, and to provide details about how subscribers of our poster update service will receive these updates.
- Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) Poster: The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) recently published an updated version of the (FLSA) notice to reflect changes to federal labor law. According to the DOL, “previous versions, including the August 2016 version, no longer fulfill the posting requirement and should be replaced”. Therefore, All US employers are required to post this new version in the workplace.
- Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) Poster: The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) recently published an updated version of the FMLA notice. All covered employers are required to display this notice which summarizes provisions of the Family and Medical Leave Act and tells employees how to file a complaint. According to the DOL, “the April 2016 and February 2013 versions still fulfill the posting requirement”, making this update a recommended but not mandatory update.
- The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) Know Your Rights Poster: According to the DOL, the EEOC is in the process of updating its “Know Your Rights” poster to address provisions of the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, which goes into effect on June 27, 2023. When the new version is published, we anticipate that the old version will no longer fulfill the posting requirement and will need to be replaced. The EEOC has not provided a specific date on which to expect the new posting.
Notification for both the FLSA and FMLA changes were emailed to all poster subscribers last week, including instructions for downloading and posting the updated notice. By following the instructions included in the email, subscribers will remain compliant with federal posting requirements. An additional E-Update will be emailed to subscribers following the release of the updated EEOC notice.
If you are not on our poster subscription service, ask your payroll specialist for details.
