PERM Labor Certification: Process, Wages, and Recruitment

PERM labor certification is the Department of Labor process an employer must complete before sponsoring most foreign workers for an employment-based green card. It exists to confirm two things: that no able, willing, and qualified U.S. worker is available for the specific job, and that hiring a foreign worker will not undercut wages or working conditions for Americans in the same occupation. The employer runs the process, the employer pays for it, and it typically takes well over a year from the prevailing wage request to a decision.

Where PERM Fits in the Green Card Process

PERM is not a green card application. It is a labor market test. Once the Department of Labor certifies the result, the employer files an I-140 immigrant petition with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, and the foreign worker later applies for permanent residence. Most workers in the EB-2 (advanced degree) and EB-3 (skilled worker or professional) categories need an approved PERM before anything else can move.¹

The date the Department of Labor accepts the application becomes the priority date, which sets the worker’s place in line for a visa number. For workers from countries with long backlogs, that date can matter for years afterward.²

Setting the Job Requirements

The position must be real, full-time, and permanent. Temporary and seasonal jobs do not qualify. The qualifications listed for the role have to reflect what the job actually needs, not what the preferred candidate happens to have on their resume.³

The Department of Labor benchmarks each occupation against a federal database called O*NET. Requirements that fall within O*NET’s typical education, experience, and training levels for the occupation are treated as normal. Requirements that go beyond those norms trigger a higher standard called business necessity, and the employer has to show the extra requirement is essential to performing the job at that specific business. Non-normal requirements must be flagged on the application itself. Failing to flag them draws a denial even where the employer could have justified them.³

Prevailing Wage Determination

Before recruiting, the employer requests a prevailing wage determination from the Department of Labor’s National Prevailing Wage Center. This sets the minimum salary the employer must offer. The prevailing wage is the average wage for the same occupation in the geographic area where the job will be performed.⁴

Every recruitment ad must list a wage at or above the prevailing wage, and the employer must attest that the foreign worker’s starting salary will meet or exceed it. The job is categorized under the Standard Occupational Classification system, and the wage center returns a determination at one of four skill levels. Assigning a skill level too low for the duties is a common mistake that can unravel the application months later.⁵

Recruitment

Recruitment must be completed at least 30 days but no more than 180 days before the application is filed.³ Every employer has to complete a mandatory set of steps. Professional occupations (those requiring at least a bachelor’s degree) have additional obligations on top.

Mandatory Steps for All Occupations

A job order with the state workforce agency serving the area of employment, active for 30 days.
Two Sunday newspaper advertisements in the paper of general circulation most appropriate for the occupation in the area of employment. In a rural area without a Sunday edition, the paper with the widest circulation may be used.
A workplace notice posted at the job site for 10 consecutive business days, visible where employees can see it going to or from work, and published through any in-house media the employer normally uses for recruiting. Where a union represents the occupation, the notice goes to the bargaining representative instead.⁶

Each newspaper ad must name the employer, describe the job specifically enough for workers to understand the opportunity, identify the area of employment, and list a wage no lower than the prevailing wage.³

Additional Steps for Professional Occupations

Professional positions require three more recruitment activities chosen from a list of ten: the employer’s own website, third-party job sites, job fairs, on-campus recruiting, trade or professional organizations, private employment firms, employee referral programs with identifiable incentives, campus placement offices (for jobs requiring a degree but no experience), local and ethnic newspapers, and radio or television ads. Only one of the three chosen steps may occur within 30 days of filing. For jobs requiring experience and an advanced degree, one of the two Sunday newspaper ads can be replaced with an ad in a professional journal appropriate for the occupation.³

The Recruitment Report

After recruitment ends, the employer prepares a signed report describing every step, the results, how many people were hired, and how many U.S. workers were rejected and why. Reasons for rejection must be lawful and job-related. If a U.S. applicant could learn the necessary skills through a reasonable period of on-the-job training, rejecting them for lacking those skills is not a valid basis.⁷

The report is not submitted with the initial application. It stays in the employer’s file. If an audit notice arrives, the employer has 30 days to produce it, so it needs to exist at the time of filing.

Filing Form ETA 9089

The employer files Form ETA 9089 through the Foreign Labor Application Gateway at flag.dol.gov.⁸ There is no government filing fee for the PERM application itself. Employers still take on significant costs for attorney fees, advertising, and the prevailing wage process.

Every entry on the form must match the documentation in the recruitment file. The employer signs under penalty of perjury, attesting the information is accurate and the recruitment was properly conducted.⁹ The system briefly holds the application in a pre-submitted status, usually under fifteen minutes, before issuing a permanent case number.¹⁰ The employer must keep a copy of the application and all supporting documentation for five years from filing.¹¹

Who Pays

Federal regulations prohibit the employer from charging the foreign worker for any cost tied to the PERM process. The bar covers attorney fees, recruitment expenses, and any form of reimbursement, including wage deductions, free labor, and in-kind payments.¹²

The foreign worker can pay their own attorney to represent their personal interests, but only if that attorney is separate from the employer’s. If the same attorney represents both, the employer covers the full cost. A third party with a legitimate, pre-existing business relationship with the employer may reimburse certain costs where the foreign worker’s job will benefit that third party. The prohibition applies only to the labor certification stage; costs at the later I-140 or green card stages are governed by different rules.¹²

Processing Time and the 180-Day Deadline After Approval

As of February 2026, the average processing time for PERM applications undergoing analyst review is 503 calendar days. That figure covers straightforward cases not selected for further review; audited cases take substantially longer.¹³

An approved PERM certification is valid for exactly 180 calendar days. Within that window, the employer must file the I-140 with USCIS and attach the certified Form ETA 9089. USCIS will reject an I-140 submitted with an expired certification or without one attached. Missing the deadline means starting the entire PERM process over, and it resets the priority date.¹

Certification, Audit, and Denial

If the Department of Labor finds recruitment was properly conducted, the job requirements are legitimate, and no qualified U.S. worker is available, it certifies the application.¹⁴

Any application can be audited, and some are pulled randomly for quality control. An audit letter identifies the documents required and gives 30 days to respond. Missing that deadline counts as a refusal to exhaust administrative remedies, which forfeits the right to appeal any resulting denial.¹⁵ A serious failure to produce required documentation during an audit can also place the employer under supervised recruitment for up to two years, meaning future filings must follow a more intensive, government-directed advertising process with ads approved before publication.¹⁶

The certifying officer denies an application when the employer has not met the regulatory requirements, when a qualified U.S. worker is available, or when the employment would harm wages or working conditions of American workers in the occupation.¹⁴ After a denial, the employer has 30 days to request review by the Board of Alien Labor Certification Appeals. The request goes to the certifying officer who issued the denial and must identify specific grounds. Review is limited to the evidence already in the record; new documents cannot be added at this stage.¹⁷

When PERM Does Not Apply: Schedule A

Some occupations skip the full PERM process. The Department of Labor maintains a list called Schedule A for occupations with known shortages of U.S. workers. Employers hiring for Schedule A positions do not file with DOL at all; they submit the labor certification directly to USCIS with the I-140.¹⁸

Schedule A has two groups. Group I covers professional nurses with the proper licensing or NCLEX-RN passage, and physical therapists qualified to take the licensing exam in the state where they will work. Group II covers workers of exceptional ability in the sciences or arts (excluding performing arts) who have widespread international recognition, documented through prizes, published material, memberships in selective international associations, and similar evidence.

The Schedule A path is much faster because it eliminates the advertising, the state workforce agency job order, and the DOL processing queue. Employers still post the workplace notice and file the required supporting documentation.¹⁸

1
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. USCIS Policy Manual Volume 6 Part E Chapter 6 – Permanent Labor Certification
2
USCIS. Visa Availability and Priority Dates
3
eCFR. 20 CFR 656.17 – Basic Labor Certification Process
4
U.S. Department of Labor. Prevailing Wage Information and Resources
5
eCFR. 20 CFR Part 656 – Labor Certification Process for Permanent Employment of Aliens in the United States
6
eCFR. 20 CFR 656.10 – General Instructions
7
eCFR. 20 CFR 656.17 – Basic Labor Certification Process
8
Foreign Labor Application Gateway. Foreign Labor Application Gateway
9
U.S. Department of Labor. Form ETA-9089 General Instructions
10
Department of Labor. Frequently Asked Questions
11
eCFR. 20 CFR 656.10 – General Instructions
12
eCFR. 20 CFR 656.12 – Improper Commerce and Payment
13
Flag.dol.gov. Processing Times
14
eCFR. 20 CFR 656.24 – Labor Certification Determinations
15
eCFR. 20 CFR 656.20 – Audit Procedures
16
eCFR. 20 CFR 656.21 – Supervised Recruitment
17
eCFR. 20 CFR 656.26 – Review of Denial of Labor Certification
18
eCFR. 20 CFR 656.15 – Schedule A