Who Can Complete Section 2 of the I-9 for a Remote Employee? Any Person You Choose — Within Three Business Days

Key takeaways

• The clock decides everything else. Federal regulation gives an employer three business days from the hire to examine the documents and complete Section 2. Once you see that first, "who can do it" stops being an eligibility question and becomes a scheduling one.
• Physical presence is the default. The USCIS employer handbook says: "In general, you or your authorized representative must review the employee's documentation in their physical presence."
• USCIS writes the permission affirmatively. The handbook says "You may designate, hire, or contract with any person you choose" to complete Section 2 on your behalf. The handbook adds that USCIS "does not require you to have a contract or other specific agreement" with that person.
• The condition is presence with your new hire, not your own location. The examination happens "in their physical presence." So you are looking for someone who can be in the room with your employee, inside the window.
• The same paragraph states its own limits. An employee cannot act as their own representative. A notary used this way "is not acting in the capacity of a notary" and "should not provide a notary seal on Form I-9." And "you are liable for any violations … including any violations committed by the authorized representative."
• Live video examination exists, and it is not a 2026 development. The procedure has been available since August 1, 2023, to employers who participate in E-Verify in good standing. The notice authorizing it says it "does not expire."
• Video is not a guarantee that nobody has to be in the room. The same notice says qualified employers "must allow employees who are unable or unwilling to submit documentation using the alternative procedure to submit documentation for physical examination." The employee can decline it. The three business days don't move when they do.
• Enrolling has a location condition of its own, and the condition attaches to a role rather than to you. "All E-Verify program administrators must be physically located in the United States" (the FAQ then lists which territories count). For general users, US location is a recommendation, not a requirement.
• The copy rule reverses between the two paths. Examining in person: "copies … are not acceptable." Examining remotely: looking at copies is step one, and keeping a copy is step four.
• Section 2 ends with an address field. USCIS's instruction for that field asks for a physical address and says employers "may not enter a P.O. box."

Who can complete Section 2 of the I-9 for a remote employee

You can, or any person you designate. The USCIS handbook for employers (M-274), § 2.0, puts it as a permission rather than a set of qualifications:

"You may designate, hire, or contract with any person you choose to complete, update or make corrections to Section 2 or Supplement B, Reverification and Rehire, on your behalf, such as personnel officers, foremen, notaries public, agents, or anyone acting directly or indirectly in your or your agent's interest. This person is known as your authorized representative."

The permission does not move the deadline or lower the standard. In general, whoever does it has to look at the employee's original documents in the employee's physical presence. The examination has to happen within three business days of the hire. If you participate in E-Verify in good standing, a second route opens. You may examine the documents remotely, over live video, under a DHS (Department of Homeland Security)-authorized alternative procedure.

So for a founder running a US company from somewhere else, the practical question isn't am I allowed to have someone else do this. The question is who will be standing next to my new hire in the first three days, and did I arrange that before the start date.

One assumption before we go further: that you already have the right blank form in front of you. That's a separate question with its own July date, and we handled it in which Form I-9 edition to use in 2026. The brief below is about the employer half of the form.

None of what follows is hidden. USCIS, E-Verify and the Federal Register publish all of it. What's easy to miss is the order the pieces apply in. Much of the guidance around this assumes an HR team that is already in the same country as the new hire.

Start with the clock, not with the camera

The rule that sets the shape of this is 8 CFR 274a.2(b)(1)(ii):

"Except as provided in paragraph (b)(1)(viii) of this section, an employer, his or her agent, or anyone acting directly or indirectly in the interest thereof, must within three business days of the hire: (A) Physically examine (or otherwise examine pursuant to an alternative procedure authorized by the Secretary under paragraph (b)(1)(ix) of this section) the documentation presented by the individual establishing identity and employment authorization … and ensure that the documents presented appear to be genuine and to relate to the individual; and (B) Complete section 2 … on the Form I-9 within three business days of the hire and sign the attestation…"

Two things there are worth reading slowly.

First, the sentence names the actor by relationship: the employer, the employer's agent, or anyone acting in the employer's interest. That description is written into the obligation itself rather than offered as a concession. The wording is why the "who" question resolves so quickly and the "when" question doesn't. (Where employment is for less than three business days, the same section provides that completion happens at the time of hire instead.)

Second, the clock runs from the hire. The clock does not wait for the day your paperwork is ready, or the day your courier lands. If you're the founder and you're somewhere else, those three days are already moving while you decide who to ask.

The default is physical presence, and on that path a copy isn't a document

M-274 § 4.0 states the default plainly:

"Within three business days of the date employment begins, you or your authorized representative must complete Section 2 by examining original, acceptable, and unexpired documentation, or an acceptable receipt, the employee presents…"

"In general, you or your authorized representative must review the employee's documentation in their physical presence. However, if you participate in E-Verify, you may also be eligible to remotely examine the employee's documents under the alternative procedure authorized by the secretary of homeland security."

And then the sentence that closes off the obvious workaround:

"When physically examining documents, copies, except for certified copies of birth certificates, are not acceptable."

USCIS's I-9 Central page on completing Section 2 says the same thing from the other direction. Documents must be "original (except that certified copies of birth certificates are acceptable) or … an acceptable receipt."

Think of emailed scans, a photo of a passport in a chat thread, or a PDF your new hire uploaded to your onboarding tool. On the physical-examination path, none of those is the thing the rule asks someone to look at. Somebody has to be in the room with the paper.

Two axes, not two doors: who examines × how they examine

This choice is often presented as a binary: representative or E-Verify. Reading it as two independent choices is cleaner, because the combinations behave differently and one of them is easy to miss.

Read across the bottom row and the useful thing appears: using a representative is not the "offline" option, and E-Verify is not the "do-it-yourself" option. They are separate switches. A qualified employer can still send someone in person, subject to the site-consistency rule below. An employer using the alternative procedure can still have a representative run it.

Then read the whole table with one sentence in mind. The sentence comes from the same handbook paragraph that grants the permission: "You are liable for any violations in connection with the form or the verification process, including any violations committed by the authorized representative acting on your behalf." Nothing in any of the four cells moves that.

"Any person you choose" and the three things the same paragraph also says

The permission in § 2.0 is generous, but it doesn't arrive alone. The paragraph that grants it also states three limits, and they are the ones that actually come up.

1. The employee can't do it for themselves. "Employees cannot act as authorized representatives for their own Form I-9." That matters more than it sounds like it does. The tempting shortcut for a distributed team is to have the new hire photograph their own documents and fill in both halves. The handbook closes that door by name.

2. A notary you use here is not acting as a notary. "If you choose to use a notary public as an authorized representative, that person is not acting in the capacity of a notary. This person must perform the same required actions as an authorized representative, including signatures. When acting as an authorized representative, a notary public should not provide a notary seal on Form I-9." Notaries appear on the handbook's own list of examples, so using one is contemplated. But the deliverable is a completed Section 2, not a notarized anything. A stamped I-9 is a signal that the arrangement was misunderstood.

3. The liability doesn't move. We quoted the liability sentence above, and it's the sentence to keep. Delegating the task doesn't delegate the exposure.

There's a fourth line that surprises people in the other direction: "USCIS does not require you to have a contract or other specific agreement with your authorized representative for Form I-9 purposes." You may want one anyway, for your own reasons. But the absence of paperwork between you and the person examining the documents isn't itself the defect.

What qualifications does an authorized representative need, and why isn't that the useful question?

The handbook answers the qualification question by describing duties:

"The authorized representative must perform all the employer duties described in the instructions and this handbook, and complete, sign and date Section 2 or Supplement B, Reverification and Rehire, on your behalf."

That answer quietly relocates the question. The permission is broad and the liability stays with you. So "is this person allowed?" is rarely what decides the outcome. What decides it is this: will this person actually read the instructions, look at the originals, complete every field, and sign on the correct day?

That's a competence-and-availability question. Ask it when you're choosing between a friend near the employee, a manager at a partner company, a local professional, or a service.

It helps to know what sits behind it. 8 CFR 274a.10(b)(2) provides civil penalties for failing to comply with the verification requirements. The penalty is assessed "for each individual with respect to whom such violation occurred" (the rule then sets dollar ranges by date). The regulation directs that the amount take account of "(i) The size of the business of the employer being charged; (ii) The good faith of the employer; (iii) The seriousness of the violation; (iv) Whether or not the individual was an unauthorized alien; and (v) The history of previous violations of the employer."

We're not quoting figures. The amounts in the regulation text are a range rather than a set charge, and they're subject to periodic inflation adjustment. We didn't verify the currently adjusted numbers. So take the structure as the point. The penalty is assessed per individual, the size of the business is one of the listed factors, and good faith is explicitly in the calculus.

The E-Verify route: available since 2023, not new this year

If you'd rather examine the documents yourself, from wherever you are, that route exists. Its start date is worth being precise about, because in the write-ups we read it often gets framed as though something changed recently. The authorizing notice, published in the Federal Register on July 25, 2023, says:

"DATES: The alternative procedure is available beginning on August 1, 2023."

and

"The alternative procedure described in this document does not expire. However, DHS may amend or cancel it upon the Secretary's determination that doing so is necessary to maintain an equivalent level of security or as a temporary measure to address a public health emergency … or a national emergency…"

So the alternative procedure is a standing procedure with a stated caveat attached, rather than a program with a countdown on it. What it does have is a gate:

"At this time, the alternative procedure is available only to qualified employers, meaning those employers who are participants in good standing, in E-Verify. A participant in good standing in E-Verify is an employer that has enrolled in E-Verify with respect to all hiring sites in the United States that use the alternative procedure; is in compliance with all requirements of the E-Verify program … and continues to be a participant in good standing in E-Verify at any time during which the employer uses the alternative procedure."

Four features of that gate are easy to skim past:

• The gate is continuous, not a one-time qualification. Good standing has to hold "at any time during which the employer uses the alternative procedure."
• The gate attaches to hiring sites. The enrollment requirement is written per site. Your company's structure may not map neatly onto "sites." If so, put that question to E-Verify before you rely on the procedure, rather than settling it by assumption.
• The gate comes with training. USCIS states that "New E-Verify enrollees and users will complete an E-Verify tutorial that includes fraudulent document awareness training."
• The gate has a location condition, and the condition lands on a person, not on your passport. E-Verify takes this up in a FAQ with exactly that title: "All E-Verify program administrators must be physically located in the United States, which includes the 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands." For the other role, E-Verify stops short of a requirement: "As a best practice E-Verify recommends, but does not require, E-Verify general users to be physically located in the United States." So the question isn't whether you are in the US. The question is who will hold the program administrator role on the account.

There's also a consistency rule that trips people up, and the rule cuts both ways:

"If you choose to offer the alternative procedure to new employees at an E-Verify hiring site, you must do so consistently for all employees at that site. However, you may choose to offer the alternative procedure for remote hires only but continue to apply physical examination procedures to all employees who work onsite or in a hybrid capacity, so long as you do not adopt such a practice for a discriminatory purpose or treat employees differently based on their citizenship, immigration status, or national origin…"

In other words, you can't hand-pick which individuals get the video option. You can draw the line at remote versus onsite, with the non-discrimination condition attached in the same sentence.

And there is a limit on the whole switch that the consistency rule doesn't cover: the employee can decline. The notice raises it as a question and answers it without qualification:

"If the employee does not want the employer to apply the alternative procedure with respect to that employee, can qualified employers refuse to perform physical document examination? No, qualified employers must allow employees who are unable or unwilling to submit documentation using the alternative procedure to submit documentation for physical examination. Nothing in the alternative procedure prevents an employer from physically examining documents when requested to do so by an employee."

That answer changes what enrolling actually buys you. Enrolling is not insurance against ever needing someone in the room. The video route is an option you may offer and a new hire may turn down. If they turn it down, the physical path is back and the three business days haven't moved. The notice says the same thing from the employer's side a few questions earlier: "Use of this alternative procedure is entirely optional."

The copy asymmetry: the same document, two paths, opposite handling

Here's the detail that reframes the choice. In what we found, it doesn't turn up in the usual summaries.

On the physical path, the handbook states it as a rule with one narrow exception: "copies, except for certified copies of birth certificates, are not acceptable."

On the remote path, M-274 § 4.5 makes examining copies step one:

"Examine copies (front and back, if the document is two-sided) of Form I-9 documents or an acceptable receipt to ensure that the documentation presented reasonably appears to be genuine; Conduct a live video interaction with the individual presenting the document(s)… The employee must first transmit a copy of the document(s) to the employer (per Step 1 above) and then present the same document(s) during the live video interaction; Indicate on the Form I-9, by completing the corresponding box, that an alternative procedure was used…; and Retain a clear and legible copy of the documentation (front and back if the documentation is two-sided)."

So the same artifact, a scan of a passport, is inadmissible on one path and mandatory on the other. The scan is mandatory twice, in fact: once as the thing you review in advance, and once as a record you're required to keep.

The reason is visible in the sequence. The copy isn't a substitute for the original. The employee "must first transmit a copy … and then present the same document(s) during the live video interaction." The remote path doesn't drop the look at the real document. The remote path puts a copy in front of that look and another copy behind it. Elsewhere in the handbook, USCIS says it outright: employers examining remotely "may accept copies of documentation, but must then view original documentation in a live video interaction." That is why the intuitive workaround, just have them email me a scan, is not a lighter version of the remote procedure. A scan by email is neither procedure.

There's also a box to tick. USCIS: "Check the box in the Additional Information field if you participate in E-Verify and used an alternative procedure to remotely examine your employee's documents." If you use the video route, saying so on the form is part of the route.

If you're the one who isn't in the US

Strip out the mechanics and the founder version is short.

The condition the rule states is presence with the employee. The examination happens "in their physical presence." Your new hire is in the US, which is why there's an I-9 at all. So what you actually need is someone who can reach them, in person, inside the window. In the materials we checked, we found no separate requirement about where the examiner is based. The binding condition is the one about being with the employee. In practice that condition lands in the same place: the examination happens where your employee is.

That is a smaller and more solvable problem than "find a US compliance person." The presence problem is also different from the one most of the guidance we surveyed is written to answer.

Practically, it leaves a short list of decisions, all of which are better made before the start date than after:

1. Fix the date and count. Three business days from the hire. Write the actual deadline down; it's the number that moves on its own. The window is also wider at the front than most people assume. M-274 says you may complete Section 2 "at any time from the date the employee accepts the job offer and completes Section 1 to within three business days from the date of hire." So the examination can happen before day one, and scheduling it there is the version of this that doesn't go wrong.
2. Decide the path, and don't treat E-Verify as the escape hatch. Choose someone physically with the employee, or the alternative procedure if you're already a participant in good standing. Enrolling isn't an instant switch. Enrolling involves signing up, completing the required training, and having a program administrator physically located in the US. Even then, your new hire can ask for physical examination instead, which puts you back on the first path with the same deadline.
3. Name the person, and brief them properly. They must perform all the employer duties described in the form instructions and the handbook. Send them the instructions, not a summary of the instructions.
4. If they're a notary, tell them two things first. They're acting as your representative, not as a notary, and no seal goes on the form.
5. Decide what goes in the employer address block before the day, not during it. More on that below.

One boundary sits upstream of all of this. The clock starts at "the hire," so the threshold question is whether the person you're bringing on is an employee at all. Worker classification runs on its own tests and has its own paperwork consequences. We untangled the tax-form side of that boundary in the 1099-K threshold for 2026 versus 1099-NEC. If you're genuinely unsure which side of the line someone falls on, that's a question for counsel before it's a question about forms.

One question the documents we checked don't settle

Being straight about the edges is more useful than filling them in.

What happens to already-completed remote I-9s if you later lose E-Verify good standing? The Federal Register notice conditions the procedure on remaining a participant in good standing "at any time during which the employer uses the alternative procedure." The companion final rule states the forward-looking half: an enrolled employer not in good standing "is ineligible to use the alternative procedure." Neither document takes up the status of examinations completed while you were in good standing, and we're not going to reason our way to an answer. If the question is live for you, put it to immigration counsel or to E-Verify directly.

The last box on the form: a physical address, and no P.O. box

Section 2 closes with the employer's own details, and USCIS's I-9 Central instruction for that field is specific:

"Enter the employer's business name and physical address. Employers may not enter a P.O. box as their address. If your company has multiple locations, use the most appropriate address that identifies the location of the employer with respect to the employee and their Form I-9 completion (for example, the address where Form I-9 is completed)."

The employer handbook words the same field a little differently: "Enter the business's physical street address, city or town, state, and ZIP code." The handbook's multi-location sentence stops before the parenthetical. Both are USCIS. The version quoted above is the one that says where to look when you have more than one address.

Two observations apply to a company being run from outside the country.

The multi-location instruction points at "the address where Form I-9 is completed." That is a sensible tiebreaker for an employer with offices. For you, it may be a genuinely open question, because the completion happened wherever your representative met your employee. The guidance we're quoting is written for the multiple-locations case. The guidance doesn't reach a single-location company whose representative examined documents in a city where the company has no presence. Resolve that with counsel rather than guessing, especially if you're about to write the same address onto every form you file from here on.

And the explicit exclusion is narrow, so read it literally. What this instruction rules out by name is a P.O. box. The USCIS materials we checked do not take up whether a particular address arrangement satisfies "physical address" for this field. So we're not going to tell you that it does.

A first US hire is usually the moment a company stops being one person with a laptop. The company becomes an entity that agencies, insurers and providers write to. If the address on your filings is a former coworking desk or a friend's apartment, fix it this week rather than the week you find out.

FAQ

Can an employer verify I-9 documents for a remote employee? Yes, by one of two routes. In the first route, someone examines the original documents in the employee's physical presence. That person can be you or an authorized representative you designate. In the second route, if you participate in E-Verify in good standing, you use the DHS-authorized alternative procedure to examine the documents remotely over a live video interaction. USCIS's I-9 Central states it as a default with an exception: "Employers must physically examine documents, except, employers that participate in E-Verify may use an alternative procedure authorized by the Secretary of DHS to remotely examine documents." Either way, Section 2 has to be completed within three business days of the hire.

Can a family member, spouse, or parent complete Section 2 as my authorized representative? USCIS's handbook frames this as a permission you hold: "You may designate, hire, or contract with any person you choose … such as personnel officers, foremen, notaries public, agents, or anyone acting directly or indirectly in your or your agent's interest." Those examples are roles rather than a closed list. The person that paragraph names as ineligible is the employee: "Employees cannot act as authorized representatives for their own Form I-9." The same paragraph puts the liability on you. So the real filter isn't who is permitted. The real filter is who will read the instructions, examine the originals, complete every field, and sign on the right date. A relative of the employee is an awkward choice for exactly that reason.

Does the authorized representative have to be a notary, and if I use one, do they notarize the form? Notaries appear on USCIS's list of examples, but they are one option among several. The handbook is explicit about the capacity they act in: "that person is not acting in the capacity of a notary," and "a notary public should not provide a notary seal on Form I-9." The job is to perform the same required actions as any authorized representative, including the signature. If a form comes back with a notarial seal on it, something in the arrangement was misunderstood.

Who signs Section 2, and what do I put in the title field? The person who examined the documents signs. M-274 § 4.0 pairs the two acts explicitly: "The same person who examined the employee's documents must also complete the fields in the certification block, then sign and date Section 2." The handbook adds that the authorized representative "must perform all the employer duties described in the instructions and this handbook, and complete, sign and date Section 2 … on your behalf." On the wording of the certification fields themselves, the materials we checked describe the role rather than prescribing a job title. So use the current form instructions from I-9 Central as the authority for what belongs in each field, rather than a summary like this one.

If my authorized representative fills it in wrong, who is liable? You are. The handbook says so in the same paragraph that grants the permission: "You are liable for any violations in connection with the form or the verification process, including any violations committed by the authorized representative acting on your behalf." That's also why "USCIS does not require you to have a contract" is less reassuring than it first sounds. No agreement is needed to appoint someone, and the liability sentence isn't conditioned on whether one exists.

I'm outside the United States. Can I examine the documents myself over video? The route the documents describe for examining remotely is the alternative procedure, and it requires that you participate in E-Verify in good standing. USCIS: "You must participate in E-Verify in good standing if you want to remotely examine your employee's documents." E-Verify addresses the location half of your question directly, in a FAQ titled Must E-Verify users be located inside the United States?: "All E-Verify program administrators must be physically located in the United States" (the FAQ then lists which territories count). For general users, location is a recommendation: "E-Verify recommends, but does not require" it. So the condition attaches to a role on the account rather than to where you personally sit.

A separate E-Verify FAQ was written in 2014 for foreign companies working under a federal contract with the FAR E-Verify clause. That FAQ states that "USCIS only allows companies located in the United States to enroll in E-Verify" and that such an employer "would need to have a presence in the United States." The 2014 FAQ is scoped to FAR contractors and is over a decade old. Treat it as a reason to confirm your own situation with E-Verify rather than as the general rule.

Keep two things in view either way: enrolling isn't instant, and your employee can still ask for physical examination. If your first start date is days away, designating someone who can be physically present is the realistic path.

Which address goes in Section 2 if my representative examined the documents in another city? USCIS's instruction is to enter the employer's business name and physical address, and it states that employers "may not enter a P.O. box as their address." For companies with multiple locations, it points to "the most appropriate address that identifies the location of the employer with respect to the employee and their Form I-9 completion (for example, the address where Form I-9 is completed)." That guidance is written for the multiple-locations case. The guidance doesn't speak directly to a one-location company whose representative met the employee somewhere else. If that's your situation, get a view from counsel rather than inferring one from the multi-location example.

Bottom line

The question sounds like a permissions question and is actually a logistics question. USCIS grants the permission in one sentence: "any person you choose." The rest of the page covers the parts that bind. Those parts are three business days from the hire, original documents, and the employee's physical presence unless you're an E-Verify participant in good standing using the alternative procedure. And the liability stays with you no matter who holds the pen.

Your company may be American while your desk isn't. For that founder, the topic collapses into one thing to act on: decide, before the start date, who will be in the room with your new hire. The E-Verify route is worth having, but it is not a way around that decision. The route needs a program administrator physically in the US, and it takes enrollment and training to get. The employee it's meant for can also decline it and ask for physical examination anyway.

USCIS grants the permission by relationship rather than by credential, and it says outright that no contract is required. In the materials we checked, nothing attaches a license or a job title to the role. What the person does need is to be reachable, reliable, and there.

Where an Auteur address fits

We sell virtual mailboxes, so read this section as the seller's view. Auteur is in pre-launch, and your exact street address is assigned the day your city opens.

Mail about your new hire from agencies, insurers, and payroll providers is mail for your company. The Virtual Business Address receives mail in a business or trade name. The Virtual Mailing Address is for personal mail, in individual names only.

Both plans include a photo of every envelope as it arrives. Opening and scanning a piece is one flat fee, only when you ask. Henry, our AI assistant, explains each letter you ask us to open. Pricing comes by email with the next steps, and our fair use policy lists our fees and limits. USPS Form 1583 is required before any provider can receive mail for you.

A mailing address does not complete Section 2 for you or examine your new hire's documents. The USCIS materials we checked also do not say whether a virtual address fits the Section 2 address field. For mail in your company's name, get your Virtual Business Address. Ordering is free, and nothing is charged today.

This is general information about federal employment eligibility verification procedures, not legal advice. Agency handbooks and instructions are revised. Confirm current requirements on USCIS's I-9 Central, and take questions about your own hires, your worker classifications, or your E-Verify status to a qualified professional.