PERM is the permanent labor certification process run by the Department of Labor, and it is where most employer-sponsored EB-2 and EB-3 green card cases begin. Its purpose is a labor market test: the employer must show that it tried to fill the position with U.S. workers at the prevailing wage and that none qualified. PERM is not a visa or a petition — it produces one document, a certified Form ETA-9089, which the employer then files with USCIS as part of the I-140. The employer runs the process and bears its costs; the worker is the beneficiary, not the applicant.

Status as of July 24, 2026. DOL publishes queue positions monthly on the FLAG processing times page. As of July 17, 2026, PERM analyst review was adjudicating applications filed in July 2025, audit review was working through December 2025 filings, and requests for reconsideration by the Certifying Officer stood at March 2026. The average processing time DOL reported for June 2026 was 403 calendar days for analyst review and 290 days for audit review. On the prevailing wage side, as of June 30, 2026 the National Prevailing Wage Center was processing PERM requests filed in April 2026 for OEWS-based determinations and March 2026 for non-OEWS. These figures change monthly and are checked at flag.dol.gov/processingtimes.

The three stages before a case reaches USCIS

The first stage is the prevailing wage determination. The employer files Form ETA-9141 with the National Prevailing Wage Center, describing the position, its location, and its minimum requirements; DOL returns the wage the position must pay. The determination has a validity window, and the recruitment and filing must happen inside it.

The second stage is recruitment, governed by 20 CFR 656.17. For professional occupations the mandatory steps are a 30-day job order with the state workforce agency serving the area of intended employment and two advertisements on different Sundays in a newspaper of general circulation, plus three additional recruitment steps chosen from the regulatory list — a job fair, the employer's website, a professional journal, and others. A notice of filing is posted at the worksite for 10 consecutive business days. All steps must fall between 30 and 180 days before the application is filed, and only one of the additional steps may occur within the final 30 days. That last constraint is what practitioners call the quiet period.

The third stage is the application itself: Form ETA-9089, filed through DOL's Foreign Labor Application Gateway (FLAG). Its filing date becomes the priority date for a PERM-based case — the worker's place in line, explained further in the piece on the priority date.

What DOL does with the application

Most applications go to analyst review and are decided on the record. Some are selected for audit, either randomly or because something in the filing invites scrutiny; an audited case moves into a separate and slower queue, as the FLAG figures above show. DOL can also order supervised recruitment, in which the Certifying Officer directs and reviews a fresh round of advertising.

There is no premium processing at this stage — it exists only later, at the I-140. A denied application can be challenged through a request for reconsideration to the Certifying Officer or an appeal to the Board of Alien Labor Certification Appeals (BALCA), each with its own queue. Because the employer's certified job requirements determine which preference category the case supports, an error at this stage surfaces months or years later, when it is expensive to fix.

What certification does and does not give

A certified ETA-9089 is not status, work authorization, or permission to remain in the United States. It certifies the labor market test for one position with one employer, and it comes with a deadline: the certification must be filed with the I-140 within 180 days, or it expires. The employer's obligations continue past certification — the position must remain a bona fide, full-time offer at the certified wage.

Routes that skip this stage entirely are the EB-1 categories, Schedule A occupations, and the EB-2 national interest waiver, which is covered separately in the piece on the national interest waiver. How the two employer-sponsored categories differ once certification is in hand is covered in EB-2 vs EB-3; the broader process is in the employment-based green card section.

How long does PERM take?

The DOL stages alone currently run well over a year: analyst review was working on July 2025 filings as of mid-July 2026, and DOL reported an average of 403 calendar days for that queue in June 2026. Add the prevailing wage determination before it and the recruitment window, and an audit if one is issued. The only current figures are the FLAG processing times page, which DOL updates monthly.

Who pays for PERM?

The employer. There is no government filing fee for the ETA-9089 itself, but the recruitment costs — newspaper advertising, job fairs, and the rest — fall on the employer, and DOL regulations prohibit shifting the costs of the labor certification, including attorney fees for that stage, onto the worker.

Can PERM be expedited?

No. There is no premium processing for the prevailing wage determination, for the ETA-9089, or for audit review. Premium processing becomes available only at the next step, the I-140 petition with USCIS.

What happens if the employer withdraws or the worker changes jobs?

The labor certification belongs to the position and the employer, so it does not travel with the worker to a new job. What can survive is the priority date from an approved I-140, which a beneficiary can generally retain for a later employment-based petition, subject to limited exceptions tied to revocation. Whether a specific move preserves it is assessed with a licensed attorney.