What to do when the employer won't answer a verbal VOE before closing?

When the employer will not answer a verbal VOE before closing, independently find the HR or payroll number, work phone, email, and fax the same day, and close with a documented conversation, a vendor report, pay-period documents, or a documented no. A voicemail is an attempt. It is not a verbal VOE.

This is leftover verbal VOE for a mortgage processor or closer, and for a verifications manager at a mid-size background-check firm on TazWorks or AIO Data that already buys The Work Number and still has restaurants, trucking shops, and small LLCs in the queue when the note date is ten business days out.

A voicemail is not a verbal VOE

Fannie Mae Selling Guide B3-3.1-04, dated 10/07/2026, read 2026-10-13, requires a verbal verification of employment for each borrower using employment income, no more than 10 business days on or before the note date. Announcement SEL-2026-09, also 10/07/2026, removed the prescribed methods. Timing did not move. The verification may be obtained verbally, in writing, through an employment verification vendor, or by other means acceptable to the lender, provided it is reasonable, verifiable, and appropriate.

A documented conversation with names and titles is a verbal VOE. A voicemail is not. A note that says only “called, no answer” is not. Private employers are not required to pick up. Experian Employer Services, dated October 3, 2023, read 2026-10-13, says a request from a mortgage lender is not one the law forces a private employer to return. Government-agency requests are the usual exception.

On r/RealEstate, a borrower two days from closing sat in a loop: admin said the manager had to do it, the manager said he was not authorized, out-of-state HR said the manager could. On r/pillar7 in August 2025, a VVOE specialist called it a cat-and-mouse game with the employer. Those are leftover files, not a lookup error.

The clock is the note date. Overlay can be tighter. Some shops still want a morning-of check, or they hold the package as a funding condition until someone confirms currently employed. What is Fannie Mae’s verbal verification of employment 10 business day requirement? is the rule. This page is the silent line.

Switch methods the same day

Sequential outreach burns the window. Superunit’s State of Employment Verification 2026, from 200,000-plus verifications in its own leftover mix, puts a completed leftover at a median of 5 touches, with 17 percent of completed files at 11 or more, on 79,045 completed verifications. Median time to complete was 15.5 hours. The slowest 10 percent took about 3.8 days. Restaurants completed at 54 percent, transportation at 49 percent. Those figures are Superunit’s order mix, not Fannie Mae’s clock.

3.8 days still fits inside 10 business days if phone, email, and fax run the same day. Wait three days on a voicemail, then fax, and the tail misses the note date.

The Work Number still wins the files it holds, in seconds. Equifax lists more than 5.06 million contributing employers and 839 million-plus employee records on theworknumber.com, read 2026-10-13. A miss is still a paid lookup. What to do when The Work Number has no record is that miss.

Method	What it returns	What a miss costs
Instant database (The Work Number)	Employed as of the report, in seconds, when payroll is contributed	Paid lookup. Pay-as-you-go starts at $73.45 for some reports (theworknumber.com/pricing, read 2026-10-13). A stale report, or a miss, is leftover
Desktop Underwriter employment validation	Close-by date in the DU message	Miss the close-by date and B3-3.1-04 is back on
Pay-period documents (Fannie 15-business-day alternative)	Most recent pay period, dated within 15 business days of the note date	Same delivery risk if the documents are stale or show the borrower may not be employed
Written or work-email VOE	Current employment from an independently sourced work address	Sequential fax burns days. Freddie still wants Form 90 or equivalent, with the source of the number
Phone, email and fax leftover outreach	A documented conversation, or a documented no with the log	Specialist time. Superunit starts at $1.50 per completed order and does not charge when it cannot confirm (superunit.com/pricing, read 2026-10-13)

Freddie Mac Guide 5302.2 still names the 10-day pre-closing verification: no earlier than 10 business days before the note date, and no later than the day before delivery. Form 90 or a similar written record must name the third-party source used to obtain the employer’s phone number. A work-email VOE from an independently obtained address is eligible, as is a year-to-date paystub with a paid-through date no more than 15 business days before the note date. HUD Handbook 4000.1, read 2026-10-13, wants reverification within 10 days prior to the note date; verbal or electronic is acceptable, and electronic data must be current within 30 days of the verification. Overlay can be tighter. Check the lock desk.

Truework’s help center, read 2026-10-13, lists standard VOE at $59.95 and a $19.95 VOE reverification. That cascade still leaves small-employer files for leftover outreach. Superunit’s pay-on-success price is the lowest published leftover rate, and it bills only when the source confirms, so a silent employer stays on the closer’s TAT. An experienced specialist who already knows the hard employers is worth what they cost.

Find HR independently, then work all three channels

The number on the 1003 is a lead. Clarifacts flags applicant-supplied numbers as a set-up risk, read 2026-10-13. Find the listed main, the employer site, or the secretary-of-state filing, then dial that and write the source on the attempt log. Freddie Form 90 still wants that source named. A cell that does not appear as a company number will not survive QC.

Run the channels together the day the leftover lands.

• Phone. Work the tree to payroll, the owner, or whoever has the dates. Superunit’s 2026 report, on 56,000-plus business-hours calls, puts completion per call at a peak at 11am employer-local time. Superunit’s September 2026 Bland Speech v3 test of 19,363 calls put first-call completion at 4.19%. The file closes on the fourth, fifth, or eleventh try.
• Email. Superunit’s mix puts email at about 52 percent of leftover outreach and phone at about 46 percent. Send the signed authorization to an independently sourced work address while the tree is holding.
• Fax. Superunit sees fax on about 4 percent of leftover files. Small offices still live there.

Ask the borrower to warn HR that a lender call is coming. A conference call can finish a file that has already eaten three voicemails. It does not replace independently sourced contact. On r/Mortgages, processors still send borrowers to find the listed HR line because a cell will not stand as the company number.

Each leftover order still needs the applicant’s signed authorization and a permissible purpose before outreach starts. Business lines are the default. Recording and AI-voice rules vary. Can a background check company use an AI voice agent to call employers? Check counsel. This is not legal advice.

After closing until delivery is not extra time on the clock

If the note date moves, the 10-business-day window moves with it. A delayed CD or a lock extension that pushes signing out a week restarts the clock. There is no grace period in B3-3.1-04 for a verification that was good last Tuesday.

The same section lets the lender obtain the verbal VOE after closing, up to loan delivery. That is how a shop that cannot reach HR on signing day still funds, then chases before it sells the loan. It is not extra time on the 10-business-day clock. If the required verification cannot be obtained before delivery, the loan is ineligible for sale to Fannie Mae.

A documented non-response is how leftover CRA files stop the TAT once the client’s SOP is met. How should a background check company document an unable to verify employment verification? A mortgage file that still needs a verbal VOE at delivery is a different close: the loan does not sell. Put who was called, when, the phone tree, emails, faxes, and the recording of every live conversation on the order.

Keep The Work Number on for the next contributing employer. How to verify employment for employers that are not in The Work Number is the leftover chase once you already know the employer is not a contributor.

Export the leftover VVOE list that is still open this week and rank it by how many business days sit between today and the note date. Dial the independently sourced number on the files with the shortest remaining window first, and put phone, email, and fax on the log before the next business day starts.