For those currently unemployed - help thread

[The Heretic]

Oregon unemployment: 334,000 file claims during coronavirus pandemic

 

[The Heretic]

https://www.oregon.gov/employ/Documents/UI%20101%20Question%20and%20Answer%20Sheet_FINAL.pdf

How much can someone receive in weekly unemployment benefits?

Regular unemployment benefits are generally 1.25 percent of a worker's earnings over a 12-month period. For example, a worker who earned $12.50 per hour, working 40 hours per week for the past year would generally receive $325 per week in unemployment benefits. In 2020, regular unemployment benefit payments range from a minimum amount of $151 per week to a maximum amount of $648 per week. In addition, pandemic unemployment benefits are available for those eligible for benefits during the weeks starting March 29, 2020 through the week ending July 25, 2020.

 

[The Heretic]

 

[The Heretic]

Oregon close to providing unemployment benefits to self-employed workers

The Oregon Employment Department hopes to have the new system up and running in a week, and it can't come soon enough.

www.kgw.com

 

[The Heretic]

Oregon, Washington unemployment claims dip in mid-April

Though the unemployment claims remain historically high, both Oregon and Washington saw a decrease in initial claims from the previous week.

www.koin.com

 

[The Heretic]

Oregon CARES recipients ask: Where’s my money?

In Oregon, those who are receiving that extra $600 weekly check wonder why they didn’t get that money this week.

www.koin.com

 

[The Heretic]

For ORegon:

A key piece of your re-employment plan will be contacting employers who hire people with your experience, training and skills. Unless otherwise advised by an Employment Department representative, you must continue seeking work each week that you claim benefits, even if you are already employed part-time. Your efforts must reflect a genuine desire to obtain employment immediately.

You must complete at least five work seeking activities for each week that you claim benefits. Work seeking activities include, but are not limited to:

• Attending job placement meetings sponsored by WorkSource Oregon
• Participating in a job club or networking group dedicated to job placement
• Updating your resume
• Reviewing job placement websites or newspapers without responding to a job posting
• Making direct contact with an employer

Two of the five work seeking activities you complete each week must be direct contact with an employer. This means contacting them in person, by phone, by mail, or electronically to inquire about and/or apply for a job opening. You must contact the employer in the way they require.

When you claim benefits your report of work seeking activities must include:

• The date you completed the activity, and
• A description of the activity completed

When reporting direct contacts, be sure to include:

• Date of contact
• Company name, phone number and address, or online job posting ID number
• Person contacted
• Type of work or position applied for
• Method of contact, and
• Results

 

[The Heretic]

These 25 states are already paying gig workers and self-employed Americans unemployment

Half of states are currently paying out unemployment compensation under the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program, which covers gig workers, independent contractors and self-employed Americans affected by the coronavirus pandemic.

www.cnbc.com

 

[Xaevian]

For WA- job search activities are not currently required. Everyone is considered on standby under emergency rules. There is an extension available for those whose unemployment benefits have or will soon expire. You can still apply now even if your last work day was weeks ago, and file those previous weeks. You should get paid for all of them once your claim is accepted.

Thanks, @The Heretic for OR onfo.

 

[The Heretic]

For WA- job search activities are not currently required. Everyone is considered on standby under emergency rules. There is an extension available for those whose unemployment benefits have or will soon expire. You can still apply now even if your last work day was weeks ago, and file those previous weeks. You should get paid for all of them once your claim is accepted.

Thanks, @The Heretic for OR onfo.

That is more or less true for Oregon, but on their form where you enter your job search activities, there are some criteria that say something to the effect that if your employer will be hiring you back, you are sick with flu or CV symptoms, or you have been advised by a doctor or health official to stay home (or something to that effect) then you are exempt? It is confusing and I am not taking chances even though I am an at risk person (over 65, with heart and lung conditions) - but my employer will not be returning me to work, and I need to get a job anyway, so I am being diligent about doing the requirements. I don't want them to be able to say I don't qualify so I do it. I don't trust them.

I am not knocking on doors - not literally - but I am sending out resumes and doing online interviews/etc.

On Wednesday, OED adopted new temporary rules to gain greater flexibility in providing benefits to workers affected by the COVID-19 response.

"Unemployment Insurance benefits are available during temporary layoffs related to COVID-19 situations," the agency continued. "These benefits occur for employees whose employer stops operation for a short period of time, such as cleaning following a coronavirus exposure, or by government requirement. Workers can get unemployment benefits, and do not need to seek work with other employers if their place of employment will resume operations."

In order to receive benefits, affected workers must still be able to work, stay in contact with their employer, and be available to work when called back. For more information or to find a claim, you can visit the OED website here.

"Although we know the COVID-19 coronavirus is causing a reduction in economic activity both nationally and in Oregon, it's too early for unemployment rate or payroll jobs numbers to show the impact of these employment disruptions," OED said. "The Employment Department will provide more information online as updated data become available."

 

[Xaevian]

For WA only:
April 14, 2020

CR 103E (Consolidated Standby Rules, March 9, March 13, March 20, and April 14, 2020)| Emergency rules (3/20/2020)

The emergency rule consolidates standby emergency rules from March 9, March 13, and March 20, 2020, and automatically places claimants on standby during the Governor's "Stay Home, Stay Healthy" order.

This means the requirement to do job search for WA unemployment applicants is waived until further notice.

 

[Warheathen1]

@The Heretic Semper Paratus dude!

Legit, anyone looking for work needs to go hit every single delivery place near them...I'm not even joking. I work for DHS and my hours got cut in half 3 weeks ago when the VA closed. Very next day walked into a pizza joint to apply as a driver, dude didn't even make me fill out an app OR give me an interview. Started the next day.

I deliver pizzas two days a week and I've averaged anywhere from $20-40/hr per day for the last 3 weeks.

Businesses all over are seriously hurting for delivery drivers because that's their only source of revenue now that lobby's and restaurants are closed.

 

[PenTurner]

Week 5, the web site has been down this morning (Service unavailable). I have received no money so far and last I checked the system was still showing "No valid claim found". Emailed them a week ago, I have not received any contact from the unemployment office so far.

On a positive note, I did get approved for the Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) reemployment benefits. Maximum $16,224, $624 a week. I have a video conference scheduled for later this week to discuss my options, careers, and education. It will be interesting to hear what she tells me.

 

[The Heretic]

I think they do maintenance on the sites on weekends - pretty typical practice - so I wait until Monday to make my weekly claims now. You and I know how flaky such maintenance/fix updates can be, make that doubly so because the state hires people who can't get jobs in the private sector.

I look forward to hearing about TAA, but I am going to try UI benes first, then if I still don't have a job by the end of the year I may try TAA. But not sure what they could do for me - I could use some 2nd year courses on algorithms/etc., but first year courses I could probably teach and would be boring for me. If they let me pick my own courses, I would love to take some, but I don't think they let people do that - it is probably geared around steering people towards a particular career - not something I am going to change at this point being almost 66.

 

[PenTurner]

I hear ya, I am 61, and have no college education. I was in the military and learned electronics and computers. I haven't wanted to spend my money on getting a degree. I figured I would probably be retired before finishing a degree, and it wouldn't do me much good. If the government is going to pay for the classes and pay me each week, I don't see a downside to it. It will keeps my brain engaged and likely extend my life

As far as the TAA stuff, it was approved because of an existing petition against McAfee, not sure who submitted the petiton or when. Not sure if it is something you would be eligible for, but it wouldn't hurt to look into it. Maybe one of the companies you worked for has a petition against them as well?

 

[The Heretic]

I worked for Daimler for almost 9 years. The last corp I worked for that sounds like it would be applicable would have been 15+ years ago and no longer exists, so if that is what it takes to be eligible, then no, probably not.

My degree is a an AS in EE and I had very little education in CompSci or s/w eng - totally self taught. Once you have a couple of years of s/w eng./dev experience, the degree doesn't really make much difference in my experience - except that some with a BS in compsci/etc., have a better grounding in algorithms/etc. than I do. But experience still counts for more IMO - I have worked with people who have a good degree, and years of experience, but they still couldn't write good code because they stopped learning and didn't seem able or willing to improve their skills/knowledge.

I look at it as a craft and I try to always improve my skill/craft. Unfortunately when at work I am so heads down in getting the work done that I don't ever seem to have the time to devote to learning some of the underlying theory knowledge. I have seen though, that some people who write code, despite having years of "experience" (sometimes the same year over and over again - so to speak) just don't have the fundamentals down - either for the language or the basics. Simple things like checking arguments for validity, not reinventing the wheel, and not repeating yourself - that isn't hard to do or learn, yet I see a LOT of crap code written by people with degrees and/or better resumes than mine.

 

[PenTurner]

Gov. Kate Brown apologizes as Oregon's unemployment site down for many on Sunday

SALEM, Ore. – Governor Brown took to Twitter Sunday to apologize to Oregonians out of work during the coronavirus pandemic who are still experiencing errors while trying to file for unemployment benefits. Since March 15, there have been about 333,700 initial claims for unemployment insurance in...

katu.com

I am sure glad Kate Brown has apologized for the site being down today, NOT.

the employment department's computer system dates to the early 1990s. They received more than $80 million in federal funding to update those systems in 2009. Most of that money remains untouched.

So they have been sitting on $80 million in funding since 2009, it has been 11 years, I wonder when they will actually use the money to update their system as it was intended to be used?

 

[The Heretic]

This is not surprising to me. Oregon gov IT has been way behind the curve for decades.

This is what, the third or fourth weekend the system has been down or had glitches?

 

[The Heretic]

The Oregon weekly claim page where you enter info states:

You are actively seeking work if you will return to your employer or are willing to look for work when state and local emergency declarations related to the coronavirus expire or otherwise are no longer in effect.

A little ambiguous IMO, but I suppose the declarations are still in effect.

Just the same, I am actively looking for a job and I fill out the form with that info. I am guessing that the code that goes thru the weekly claims may look for empty fields in that section, and flag the weekly claim for review? *shrug*

 

[The Heretic]

No Information

Your internet initial claim has been received. Our records show that we have received your internet initial claim.

Well. That's a bit of progress!

Now if they would just validate it and my weekly entries and start sending a check or four.