Question 12 on form ETA9089

[basoul]

Job title: software developer

Experience required: yes, 60 months = 5 yrs.

Education: bs

Are the Job opportunity's requirements normal for the occupation ? YES vs NO

My attorney is marking it as: NO. And I can't understand why !! And almost all the people who I know got their PERM approved and they check the answer as yes.

[Attorney_9]

The question about whether the requirements are "normal" for the occupation is referring to whether the SVP of the employer's requirements falls within the Job zone for that occupational classification.

For example, most IT professional occupations have a job zone of 4 which means that BS +2 OR MS +0 OR 4 years and no education are considered normal for the occupation. If your position has a job zone of 4 and the employer requires BS +5 then those requirements exceed the SVP for that job zone and per DOL regulations are not "normal" for the occupation. In that case, answering "No" is correct per the DOL regulations.

[basoul]

Isn't that make it more surfaced for audit ??

[Attorney_9]

It is important that the form be filled out correctly in compliance with DOL instructions and the regulations.

Audits are primarily issued on a random basis. At certain times in the past, the DOL did target cases where the Employer listed requirements that were greater than the job zone and issued audits asking for business necessity. The DOL issued those audits accross the board, not dependent on how the Employer responded to question 12.

Based on our experience, answering "No" to question 12 does not generally increase the risk of audit. However, listing requirements greater than the job zone does mean that the employer must be prepared to justify the business necessity reason for those requirements if there is an audit.

[basoul]

So, what would be considered a normal job position for IT.

if it requires more than 5 yrs of experience and all the employees who work with the employer has 5 yrs or more.