ETA-9089 Application for Permanent Employment Certification (PERM)
The labour certification behind most employment-based green cards in the second and third preferences. The employer must first get a prevailing wage determination, then run a prescribed recruitment campaign, then file this to certify that no able, willing, qualified, and available U.S. worker was found. A certified ETA-9089 is what allows the I-140 to be filed.
- Fee
- $0 - the Department of Labor charges no filing fee. The employer must pay all recruitment and attorney costs itself and may not pass them to the worker.
- Fee waiver
- Not available
- Who files
- The sponsoring U.S. employer. The worker is the beneficiary and cannot file it.
- Where to file
- Online through the FLAG system at flag.dol.gov; mailed applications are allowed but discouraged.
- Processing time
- 336 calendar days at analyst review as of August 31, 2026, per the OFLC processing times page; audited cases take longer
Usually filed with
Part of these processes
What changed in 2025 and 2026
- The Final Determination page of the ETA-9089 is what USCIS wants with a Schedule A or national interest waiver I-140, and USCIS will only accept the version OFLC issues electronically on certification. PERM processing has lengthened steadily and now runs close to a year before any audit.
Official page. https://flag.dol.gov/programs/PERM. Download the form there, never from a third-party site; check the edition date and fee before filing.