The PERM Notice of Filing requirements are straightforward on paper: post a notice that describes the job, the wage, and the employer’s plan to file a permanent labor certification; keep it up for 10 consecutive business days; and make sure those days fall inside the 30-to-180-day window before you file Form ETA 9089. The Department of Labor treats deviations as grounds for denial rather than harmless error, so each element below matters on its own.1eCFR. 20 CFR 656.10 – General Instructions
What Must Appear on the Notice
Every Notice of Filing, regardless of PERM track, has to carry four baseline elements. It must state that the employer is filing an application for permanent labor certification for the job. It must tell readers that any person may provide the Certifying Officer with evidence bearing on the application. It must give the mailing address of the Certifying Officer who covers the geographic area of intended employment. And it must be provided within the 30-to-180-day window before filing.1eCFR. 20 CFR 656.10 – General Instructions
For applications filed under the basic labor certification process, which covers most PERM filings, the notice also has to contain everything required in the employer’s recruitment advertisements. That means the employer’s name, a job description specific enough to inform workers of the opportunity, the geographic area of employment, and the offered wage. The wage cannot fall below the prevailing wage determined by the DOL, the requirements and duties listed cannot exceed those shown on ETA 9089, and the wages and working conditions cannot be less favorable than what the foreign worker will receive.2eCFR. 20 CFR 656.17 – Basic Process
Every detail on the notice must line up with the final ETA 9089. Where the notice and the application conflict on job requirements, the DOL considers the case deniable because the Certifying Officer cannot determine the actual minimum requirements for the position.3U.S. Department of Labor. PERM Actual Minimum Requirements FAQs A mismatch is not treated as a clerical issue that can be fixed later. Most practitioners draft the notice directly from the ETA 9089 for that reason.
Where to Post It
When no union represents workers in the relevant job classification, the employer posts the notice physically at the worksite where the job will be performed. Placement is not casual: the notice must be clearly visible, unobstructed, and located where U.S. workers can read it on the way to or from work. The regulation points to areas near required wage-and-hour or occupational safety and health postings, since workers already pass those spots.1eCFR. 20 CFR 656.10 – General Instructions
Physical posting is only half the requirement. The employer must also publish the notice through every in-house channel it normally uses to recruit for similar positions. If openings usually go on an intranet, into an email blast, or onto an internal electronic bulletin board, the notice belongs in those places too.1eCFR. 20 CFR 656.10 – General Instructions Skipping the normal internal channels is a common source of denial on audit. The test is consistency with your own recruitment practice.
Unionized workplaces follow a different route. When a union represents employees in the same occupational classification as the job being certified, the employer sends written notice directly to the bargaining representative at the employer’s location in the area of intended employment, rather than posting it on a wall. The four baseline content elements still apply, along with the job description and rate of pay. Keep a copy of the letter to the union and a copy of the application form that went with it. The 30-to-180-day filing window is the same.1eCFR. 20 CFR 656.10 – General Instructions
How Long and When
The notice must stay posted, physically and electronically, for at least 10 consecutive business days. Weekends and federal holidays do not count, so the posting typically runs about two calendar weeks.1eCFR. 20 CFR 656.10 – General Instructions
Those 10 business days have to fall entirely inside the 30-to-180-day period before the PERM application is filed. The DOL has confirmed that at the time of filing, the notice must have been posted for at least 10 consecutive business days, and all of those days must fall within the 30-to-180-day window before the filing date.4U.S. Department of Labor. PERM Posting Timeframe FAQs Filing before 30 days have passed since posting invalidates the recruitment. Filing more than 180 days after the notice period lets everything go stale, and the recruitment has to be redone.1eCFR. 20 CFR 656.10 – General Instructions
Documenting the Posting
Once posting ends, assemble a file that proves the notice went up in the right place for the right duration. The audit file should contain a copy of the posted notice, a statement describing where it was posted, and copies of any in-house media used to distribute it.5eCFR. 20 CFR Part 656 – Labor Certification Process for Permanent Employment of Aliens in the United States
For a physical posting, have an authorized company representative sign and date the notice to confirm when it went up and when it came down. For an electronic posting, save screenshots or system logs showing the notice was live on the intranet or other internal platform for the full 10 business days. Assertions that “we posted it” without documentation do not hold up on audit. All of this material, along with the application and its supporting documents, must be retained for five years from the filing date.6eCFR. 20 CFR 656.10 – General Instructions
Why the Details Matter
The notice is not a formality. It creates a real channel through which any person can send the Certifying Officer evidence bearing on the application, whether about the availability of qualified U.S. workers, the appropriateness of the wages and working conditions offered, or the employer’s compliance with its obligations to current workers. The Certifying Officer is required to consider any evidence submitted through this channel.1eCFR. 20 CFR 656.10 – General Instructions
A defective notice can produce more than a single denial. A substantial failure to provide required documentation on audit results in denial of the application and can trigger supervised recruitment for the employer’s future PERM filings for up to two years.7eCFR. 20 CFR 656.20 – Audit Procedures Under supervised recruitment, the Certifying Officer approves the draft advertisement, controls where it runs, and receives applicant resumes before referring them to the employer, and the employer must produce a detailed signed recruitment report within 30 days of the officer’s request.8eCFR. 20 CFR 656.21 – Supervised Recruitment
For the most serious violations, the DOL can debar an employer, attorney, or agent from the PERM program for up to three years. Grounds include willfully providing false information, buying or selling labor certifications, a pattern of failing to comply with ETA 9089 terms, and repeated failures in audit or supervised recruitment. A single instance of fraud or willful misrepresentation can support debarment on its own.9eCFR. 20 CFR 656.31 – Labor Certification Applications Involving Fraud or Willful Misrepresentation The compliance load on the Notice of Filing is small compared with what a bad notice can cost.