No-Match Program on Indefinite Hold

Daniel Schwartz of the Connecticut Employment Law Blog reports that New Employment Verification Rules on Indefinite Hold After Court Ruling. The decision bars the Social Security Administration from sending out an estimated 114,000 no-match letters covering some 8 million employees. The primary basis for the judge’s opinion seems to be the likelihood that legally authorized workers might be fired because of their inability to resolve the discrepancies giving rise to the no-match notification. As the NY Times notes, government audits found significant problems with the data base:

In a December 2006 report cited in the court documents, the inspector general of the Social Security Administration estimated that 17.8 million of the agency’s 435 million individual records contained discrepancies that could result in a no-match letter being sent to a legally authorized worker. Of those records with errors, 12.7 million belonged to native-born Americans, the report found.

We have previously posted on the no match and other immigration issues as follows:

Four Reasons to take a "Wait and See" approach to using E-Verify

No-Match Letters Place Undue Burden on Employers

When is a "Safe Harbor" not so Safe: New Immigration Regulations for No-Match Letters

Reconciling Hazelton’s Illegal Immigrant Ordinance and the Nation’s Predicted Worker Shortage