Those automation-focused improvements implemented Tuesday to a 40-year-old computer system aim to relieve the pressure on a manual-processing framework overwhelmed by more than 350,000 applications filed since March 13 — nearly the same amount that the labor department typically receives during a two-year period.
About 174,000 of those claims were manually processed before Tuesday, and the labor department plans Wednesday night to run about 60,000 of the unprocessed requests.
“I think that’s going to put a very big dent into the claims we haven’t addressed yet,” Kurt Westby, the state’s labor commissioner, said during a news conference Wednesday with Gov. Ned Lamont. “We’re optimistic to bring that more like five-to-six-week wait down to one week as soon as we can. … By the end of the week, we expect and hope to be down to one week.”
In the past three weeks, the labor department has provided more than $107 million in unemployment benefit payments, compared with $15 million to $16 million that would usually be distributed in such a period.
State officials recommend that anyone who has applied for unemployment benefits should monitor their email for a notification from the labor department directing them on the action needed to receive their benefits.
To receive the benefits as quickly as possible, claimants are advised to use direct deposit so their benefits can be sent directly to a checking or savings account.
“If you use the new automated process, then your claim will be accelerated because it does not have to wait for the manual processing element,” Westby said. “You’re going to get your benefit much quicker, particularly if you opt for the direct-deposit option.”
Before the pandemic hit the state, a labor department staff of 20 typically handled the weekly unemployment processing. That group now includes more than 80 employees — including some from other units, retirees and former staff who had transferred to other agencies.
The department is hiring more people to help with the processing, but Westby said the department faces limits on its staffing increases.
“It takes a very experienced person to handle these claims,” he said. “The claims can be very complicated. So you can’t just stick someone in there without a significant amount of training.”
Federal aid
The labor department also announced Wednesday that processing for the Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation, which adds $600 in federal stimulus funds to every weekly state benefit payment, is scheduled to begin April 24. Those additional funds would be included in Connecticut benefit payments the following week.In addition, the Department of Labor plans to begin accepting by April 30 applications for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, the federal program that provides benefits for self-employed individuals and independent contractors.
Benefits for both programs would be retroactive to the date a person needed to apply.
As of last week, nearly 17 million Americans had filed for unemployment aid — equivalent to more than one in 10 workers.
“Everybody had some catching up to do, including the federal government. But I think when it comes to unemployment claims they stepped up,” Lamont said. “We built that (unemployment fund) up to the tune of — I don’t know — a couple hundred million dollars in the last year and a half. We were ready for a normal recession.
“This is no normal recession. I’m really going to need the feds to make sure they don’t leave 50 states with bankrupted unemployment funds.”
©2020 The Advocate (Stamford, Conn.). Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
