How Many Days Until DOL FLAG System Returns Online After Shutdown

The U.S. Department of Labor said the Foreign Labor Application Gateway came back online on October 31, 2025, restoring a critical channel for employers who file federal labor applications after a month-long outage tied to the federal government shutdown. The FLAG system had been taken offline on October 1, 2025, at the start of the funding lapse, halting electronic intake for prevailing wage requests and labor certifications used across employment-based immigration programs. With access restored, the department cautioned that employers and their representatives should plan for slower service as staff work through the accumulated backlog and a surge of new filings.

Scope and programs restored

The department’s statement marks the end of an interruption that lasted roughly 30 days, a gap that forced many stakeholders to pause planning or pivot to paper during the shutdown period. Officials emphasized that the FLAG system is fully operational, allowing users to prepare and submit new applications across multiple programs, including:

• PERM permanent labor certification
• Seasonal H-2A and H-2B
• Labor condition components tied to H-1B, E-3, and H-1B1

The return to normal access is a relief for employers with hiring timelines that depend on sequential steps, where a delay at the wage or certification stage can ripple into later visa petition windows.

Expected delays and operational realities

Even with the portal restored, the Department of Labor signaled that processing will not rebound overnight. The agency said users should expect “longer-than-normal” processing and response times while operations return to full capacity.

This warning reflects two main pressures:

1. The month-long suspension that stalled adjudications.
2. A likely uptick in submissions from employers who waited for the system to reopen in October 2025.

Practically, determinations—whether wage findings or labor certifications—may arrive later than planned, stretching hiring calendars for companies and complicating personal plans for workers tied to those applications.

Important: Plan for extended timelines and build extra lead time into hiring or immigration calendars.

Treatment of filings submitted during the outage

To manage fairness across submissions, the department outlined how it will treat items received while the FLAG portal was offline:

• Applications and correspondence sent by mail or commercial delivery between October 1 and November 2, 2025 will be manually entered into the FLAG system, with the receipt date matching the postmark.
• Email correspondence is considered received on the date it was sent.

This approach provides predictability after the shutdown pause and helps protect place-in-line for time-sensitive matters across PERM, H-2A, H-2B, H-1B, E-3, and H-1B1 processes.

Agency guidance to employers and representatives

The department urged stakeholders to move quickly on urgent matters now that the portal is live, recognizing that the agency is working through an accumulated workload. Recommended actions include:

1. Submit time-sensitive applications promptly to account for anticipated delays.
2. File earlier than usual where possible.
3. Build extra lead time into internal hiring plans.
4. Monitor agency notices closely in case additional information is requested.

This guidance applies across programs that depend on wage determinations or certifications as foundation steps before later petitions or consular processing.

Why the outage mattered

The FLAG system is the central online platform for the United States 🇺🇸 Department of Labor’s foreign labor programs, and its outage underscored how foundational the portal has become to employment-based immigration workflows. During the government shutdown, new electronic submissions were paused, creating uncertainty for employers attempting to align seasonal recruitment, university hiring cycles, or corporate staffing needs with federal timelines.

The department’s decision to honor postmarks for mailed items and timestamps for email helps bridge that gap, but it does not erase the time lost while the online gateway was unavailable through most of October 2025.

Analysis and expectations from outside observers

According to analysis by VisaVerge.com, the month-long pause has a predictable downstream effect: even when a system comes back online, the return to steady-state processing often lags because case review depends on people, not just servers. The Department of Labor acknowledged this dynamic by warning about extended timeframes while operations ramp back to full capacity.

Employers and attorneys are likely to plan for staggered outcomes, with some decisions pushed later into the calendar as teams work through both the backlog and pent-up demand.

What’s accessible now in FLAG

The Department of Labor confirmed that the FLAG system is now accessible to employers and their designated representatives, restoring the ability to:

• Draft, submit, and review cases within the portal
• Request prevailing wages that inform wage offers and PERM filings
• File H-2A and H-2B petitions that depend on strict timing
• Support the labor components for H-1B, E-3, and H-1B1

Each of these areas relies on predictable agency response times, which the department has said may be longer than usual as it clears the queue.

Intake preservation measures and ongoing monitoring

The agency’s plan to manually enter mailed or delivered items through November 2, 2025 suggests a structured intake process that preserves filing order. Email recognition by send date serves a similar function, ensuring correspondence sent during the outage is not pushed to the back of the line.

These guardrails may help prevent cascading delays for employers who acted during the shutdown and for those now filing as the portal reopens. Still, the month-long pause highlights the sensitivity of labor program timelines to federal funding disruptions, and the department’s emphasis on early filing is a clear cue for cautious planning in the weeks ahead.

Official resource and next steps

For employers and representatives working inside the portal, the official resource for current status and access remains the Department of Labor’s Foreign Labor Application Gateway (FLAG), which the agency identified as fully available:

• Official link: https://flag.dol.gov

The link offers authoritative information on platform availability and allows users to log in, prepare cases, and monitor updates as operations normalize.

What happens next hinges on throughput and communication. The department has not set a specific timeline for returning to pre-shutdown processing speeds, but it has:

• Committed to honoring receipt dates tied to postmarks and sent emails
• Committed to working through the accumulated caseload

In the meantime, employers dependent on the FLAG system—from agricultural operators relying on H-2A labor to companies pursuing PERM for future green card sponsorship—are again able to move cases forward after a pause that began on October 1, 2025 and ended on October 31, 2025. The reopening marks a necessary step toward normalcy after a disruptive October 2025, even as the aftershocks of the month-long outage continue to shape timelines across employment-based immigration.