If you are the employer: are your I-9s, public access files, and LCAs audit-ready?
DHS HSI conducted 10,000+ I-9 audits in FY2024 with civil penalties up to $2,861 per violation under 28 CFR § 85.5. H-1B Public Access Files (PAFs) under 20 CFR § 655.760 must be available within one working day of LCA filing — failure is a per-day, per-employee penalty. LCA wage violations trigger DOL backwage liability *plus* potential debarment from H-1B sponsorship for 1–3 years. Most small employers we audit have at least one critical defect in every active LCA file.
Context & Examples
Real example — Stockton agricultural processor (15 H-2A workers, 4 H-1B managers). We took over their immigration compliance after a previous attorney's PAF audit found 22 violations across 4 LCAs. We rebuilt every PAF, conducted a full I-9 self-audit (found 31 issues, all corrected with proper memorialization under 8 CFR § 274a.2(b)(1)(vii)), and built an internal calendar with every LCA expiration, every I-9 reverification, and every E-Verify TNC response. DOL did not audit — but if they had, the per-employee daily exposure across the 4 LCAs alone would have exceeded $400K.
Horror story — Sacramento restaurant chain. A small chain we did not represent was DOL-audited in 2023. PAFs were incomplete, LCA wages had been understated by $4-6/hour for two H-1B chefs, and I-9s were missing for 18 of 24 employees (none of whom were unauthorized — just sloppy paperwork). Total liability: $187K in DOL backwages + $94K in DHS civil penalties + 2-year H-1B debarment. They lost their head chef and closed two locations.
Why an attorney is essential: Compliance is the cheapest insurance an employer can buy. We charge less for an annual PAF/I-9 audit than the average DOL penalty per employee.
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