Nov 1, 2021

Members of Congress concerned about serious gaps in the unemployment insurance system took a decisive step forward October 8 by introducing H.B. 5507 in the U.S. House of Representatives. This bill, sponsored by Donald Beyer, Jr. (D,VA), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D,NY) and other representatives, would help claimants in all states, including Washington, by providing benefits for many workers who are currently excluded from our system. It would also advance another important cause: greater uniformity and increased equity of unemployment benefits from state to state.

HB 5507 would:

• Provide benefits to people who earned at least $1,500 in the prior year if they earned $1,000 in at least one quarter of that year. Washington denies benefits to a much larger group of part-time workers than any other state: anyone who has worked less than 680 hours, which excludes workers who earned less than $9,309 in their prior year based on our state’s minimum wage.
• Ensure that more people who lose a part-time job can count on support by reducing the number of past work hours required in order to qualify for unemployment benefits. Washington sets extremely strict limits on which part-time workers may receive benefits.
• Provide that all workers may seek a part-time job and still receive benefits based on their past work. They may choose to seek up to a 20-hour per week part-time job if the job is at least 1/2 of their work hours in a typical work week. Washington law requires claimants to seek full-time work except for a small number of part-time workers.
• Allowing workers to receive up to one third of their normal wage and salary through part-time work without cuts in their unemployment benefits. Washington currently cuts benefits by about 75% of every extra dollar claimants earn while collecting unemployment.
• Make other reforms in worker eligibility and benefit amounts by requiring states to provide a minimum of 26 weeks of benefits; ensuring that online claims handling can be readily understood by people with disabilities, literacy challenges, or limited English; and information is available in languages spoken by at least 1% of the state’s population.

Washington’s unemployment benefits system has many strengths but some very harsh limits as well. H.B. 5507 would significantly improve the accessibility and equity of benefits in our state.

ULP urges your support for H.B. 5507. The pandemic has resoundingly demonstrated that reform of our unemployment benefit laws is desperately needed and these reforms will help many, many workers. Help increase momentum for this bill by contacting your Congressional representatives in the House and Senate and asking for their support in seeing these reforms are passed into law. You can reach any member of Congress by calling 202-224-3121, the Congressional switchboard, and asking to be connected to your representative or senator.

October 13, 2021

OCLA-sponsored attorney team generously answers the call to help claimants with unemployment benefit appeals

Throughout the pandemic, stories about the struggle that many jobless workers in Washington have had in securing unemployment benefits they temporarily needed for basic costs of living have been front-page news and exploded on social media.

Less well known is the fact that it often takes legal counsel to navigate the benefits bureaucracy and challenge benefit denials. And that can pose a major obstacle for people who find themselves without a steady income.

Fortunately, the private bar in Washington state has come forward decisively to help address these workers’ needs by signing on with a program, sponsored by the Office of Civil Legal Aid (OCLA), that funds them to offer their advocacy services to unemployed workers at significantly reduced rates.

In a normal year, judges with the Office of Administrative Hearings might hear some 25,000 appeals of unemployment benefit denials filed by Washington claimants. But 2020, of course, was anything but normal. Due to tripled numbers of benefit applications and denials, an enormous backlog of appeals built up in our state, with appellants forced to wait months for resolution.

The unmet need for representation of claimants without a steady income went skyward. At one point this spring, OAH was faced with finding judges to hear 70,000-plus appeals and needed to turn to the legislature for special funding to keep pace.

The state funded extra administrative law judges and OCLA had its own response at the ready: a panel of attorneys available to provide counsel to claimants at significantly reduced cost. With direction and funding by OCLA, the Unemployment Law Project helped recruit and train an “OCLA panel,” a contingent of more than 40 attorneys in Eastern and Western Washington who would be on call to represent claimants in their appeals.

Already in 2021, this dedicated group has taken several hundred appeals and is on track to have helped 1,000 claimants by the end of this year. Their clients may have been denied benefits because of quitting a job, or because they couldn’t work while their children’s school was closed. Or the state may have alleged that they wrongly received benefits and must pay them back—sometimes to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars—or for dozens of other reasons.

These claimants can include single mothers, 20-year-olds who have lost their first job, people working in offices, in warehouses, in hospitals, at construction sites. It’s likely that most of them had never been unemployed before the pandemic.

Claimants routinely say that having the support of an OCLA panel attorney has been invaluable, whether or not they win their appeals. “My attorney was not only professional and knowledgeable, but also personable and caring, one claimant said. “It’s difficult to express how much relief it gave me to have my attorney by my side during this process.”

Said another: “I am deeply appreciative of the services and advice you have offered to workers who are navigating challenging, stressful, and often intimidating circumstances. You are doing work that is very important; you have my thanks and respect.”

OCLA and ULP join claimants in thanking this exceptional group of Washington attorneys who have answered the call for help and eased the blow of unemployment during the pandemic for so many people in our state.

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The Unemployment Law Project is a non-profit law firm based in Seattle and Spokane that assists unemployment claimants with appeals of benefit denials.

The Office of Civil Legal Aid‘s mission is to secure, invest, and oversee public funding for civil legal aid to low-income people in Washington State.

For further information, contact Anne Paxton, Staff Attorney & Policy Director, Unemployment Law Project, apaxton@ulproject.org, 206-441-9178 ext. 114.

In honor of Indigenous Peoples’ Day on October 11th, the Unemployment Law Project wishes to acknowledge and commemorate the many indigenous peoples native to the land now known as Washington State and all over the world. We celebrate the histories of communities that lived here from time immemorial and honor the fact that we operate on native land. We celebrate members of the Chehalis, Chinook, Colville, Cowlitz, Duwamish, Hoh, Jamestown S’Klallam, Kalispel, Kikiallus, Lower Elwha Klallam, Lummi, Makah, Marietta Band of Nooksack, Muckleshoot, Nisqually, Nooksack, Port Gamble S’Klallam, Puyallup, Quileute, Samish, Sauk-Suiattle, Shoalwater Bay, Skokomish, Snohomish, Snoqualmie, Snoqualmoo, Spokane, Squaxin, Steilacoom, Stillaguamish, Suquamish, Swinomish, Tulalip, Upper Skagit, and Yakama Tribes, Communities, and Nations, in addition to the countless other peoples who lived on this land before us. The Unemployment Law Project strives to continuously improve our ability to serve these communities with zealous and compassionate representation.

Learn more about Indigenous Peoples’ Day here.

August 10, 2021

A new hours-of-availability rule that will help many Washington state unemployment benefits claimants became final July 26, 2021. The Unemployment Law Project has been working on this reform with the Employment Security Department (ESD) since 2017. ESD proposed this rule in response to concerns ULP and other worker advocate groups have raised for several years about the impact of hours-of-availability rules on caregivers.

When the new rule (WSR 21-11-004) takes effect January 2, 2022, it will make some major changes:

• For the estimated 40% of claimants who work in fields with customary hours of 24/7, there will be no more requirement of 24/7 availability to work. Only a minimum of 40 hours of availability, chosen by the claimant, are required. (E.g., if you are offered a job that requires overtime, you are not required to accept it in order to be considered available to work.)
• A claimant’s prior shifts of employment will be considered a working condition determining suitable work. (E.g., if you are in a job with customary hours of 24/7 but you generally worked 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, you will no longer have to accept a job offer that involves variable hours or a weekend shift or a graveyard shift.)
• Claimants can choose the 40 hours they’re available, as long as the restriction on the number of hours they can work, the essential functions they can perform, and the occupations they are seeking do not substantially limit their employment prospects within their general area. (E.g., if you can only work evenings but there are very few jobs in your local area or your field of employment with those hours, you may have to expand your job search in order to be considered available to work.) 
• The rule applies to all claimants with hours restrictions, not only those who are caregivers or who rely upon caregivers.

ULP thanks the experts and advocates who helped develop this important rule change and see it to the finish line: Pamela Crone, Rep. Mia Gregerson, Anne Paxton, Carolyn McConnell, Maggie Humphreys, Moms Rising!, Suzi LeVine, the ESD policy and rulemaking teams, Legal Foundation of Washington, Washington State Labor Council, Andra Kranzler, Lillian Kaide, Monica Holland, Kelly Sennott, Jana Wolff, Rebecca Smith, Sean Phelan, Joseph Kendo, Marilyn Watkins, and Deborah Maranville.

The Unemployment Law Project also thanks donors to our organization, who provide one third of our funding. Our donors were essential in bringing about this rule change. To help our ongoing efforts to reform laws and policy on unemployment benefits, please consider a tax-deductible donation of any size to ULP. You can make a donation at https://unemploymentlawproject.org/donate/ or by contacting us at 206-441-9178.

May 12, 2021

Washington state workers will have better assurance of equitable and effective processing of unemployment claims and transparent metrics of the performance of the Employment Security Department following the enactment of SB 5193, signed today by Governor Jay Inslee.

The bill, actively backed by ULP throughout the 2021 legislative session, won passage through the leadership of its prime sponsor, Senator Mike Conway, and lead sponsor in the House, Rep. Dan Bronoske. ULP assisted with development of bill language and testimony on its behalf.

Effective July 25, 2021, SB 5193 requires ESD to:

• Launch a training program to create a pool of adjudicators to have in reserve when unemployment claims levels surge. 
• Use plain language, tested on claimants for comprehensibility, in all letters, alerts, and notices.
• Clearly explain the law behind all determinations and redeterminations, the relevant facts, the reasoning, the decision, and the result.
• Explore possible thresholds that trigger automatic adjustments in staffing, a pilot to provide a caseworker approach to benefit claims, and increased language access.
• Dedicate a toll-free number for claimants with limited computer access or computer skills, disabilities, or limited English proficiency.
• Maintain an online data dashboard and provide quarterly reports with performance metrics that include call volumes, hold times, repeat calls, and all-circuits-busy messages for employers and claimants, updates of unemployment rates, claims data, claims center phone statistics, staffing ratios, overpayment data, pending claims, pending appeals, recipiency rates, and other information. 
• Report quarterly to the legislature on progress in implementing SB 5193, including any software or technology issues causing delays, and other claims processing issues.

Other legislation to benefit unemployment benefits claimants passed this year as well. In February, Governor Inslee signed SB 5061, also supported by ULP, which protects employees’ rights to quit or refuse a job that puts them at high risk during a public health emergency and makes a waiver of waiting weeks for benefits automatic when the cost is covered by federal funds. 

[Sent via email on 3/27/21]

Dear friend of ULP:

The final hurdles have been crossed and SB 5193, an important bill, backed by ULP, which will improve many aspects of unemployment claims processing at the Employment Security Department (ESD), will be voted on at any time.

Key committees in the House of Representatives have okayed the measure and any day now, it will go to the floor for a vote before the full chamber.

The Senate already voted Yes on an earlier version of the bill. Some differences between the bills remain to be ironed out and then, with a Yes vote in the House, Washington will have several new provisions to protect claimants from the snarls, dead ends, and delays many encountered over the last 12 months when they were desperately in need of the unemployment benefits they had earned through their work.

SB 5193 requires ESD to:

• Launch a training program to create a pool of adjudicators to have in reserve when unemployment claims levels surge.
• Use plain language, tested on claimants for comprehensibility, in all letters, alerts, and notices;
• Clearly explain the law behind determinations and redeterminations, the relevant facts, the reasoning, the decision and the result;
• Explore: thresholds that trigger automatic adjustments in staffing, a pilot to provide a caseworker approach to benefit claims, and increased language access;
• Dedicate a toll-free number for claimants with limited computer access or computer skills;
• Maintain an online data dashboard, and provide quarterly reports with performance metrics that include updates of unemployment rates, claims data, claims center phone statistics, staffing ratios, overpayment data, and other information.
• Report quarterly to the legislature on various other claims processing issues.

Please help SB 5193 cross the finish line!

Contact your legislators today and request their support for this measure urgently needed to protect Washington’s more than 3 million workers.

To find your state representatives and senator, use this link: https://app.leg.wa.gov/DistrictFinder/.

Thank you for your help in ensuring that our unemployment benefits system provides support that Washington workers and their families can count on.

Sincerely,
Anne Paxton
Attorney & Policy Director
Unemployment Law Project

For more information from the Office of the Washington State Auditor (SAO), click here. For a list of Frequently Asked Questions regarding the data breach from the SAO, please click here.

On February 1, the Washington state auditor announced that hackers had obtained more than a million unemployment benefit claimant application records, leaving many 2020 benefit applicants’ identities at risk. (See State Auditor’s Office press release.)

These are steps that the Washington Department of Financial Institutions advises to prevent ID theft by an impostor or other criminal when such a data breach occurs.

Steps To Take After a Data Breach to Protect Your Financial Accounts from Fraud

CHANGE YOUR PASSWORDS

Use the security breach as an opportunity to change and strengthen your passwords, especially those related to online financial institution accounts.

TWO FACTOR AUTHENTICATION

Enable two-factor authentication to log on to your bank account to prevent unauthorized access.

ACTIVATE BANK AND CREDIT CARD ACCOUNT ALERTS

Most financial institutions offer a variety of text and e-mail alerts through online banking. You may also wish to ask your specific institution what they recommend to keep your accounts safe.

You can set up alerts for:

• When your profile or password is updated
• When an ATM withdrawal exceeds a certain amount
• When your account drops below a specific amount
• When purchases happen

MONITOR YOUR ACCOUNTS FOR UNUSUAL ACTIVITY

Monitor your financial accounts for unusual activity and withdrawals. If you notice unauthorized activity, report it to your financial institution immediately.

CONSIDER PLACING A FRAUD ALERT OR FREEZE ON YOUR CREDIT REPORT

A fraud alert informs creditors of possible identity theft or fraudulent activity within your credit file and requests that the credit grantor contact you prior to establishing any accounts in your name. A fraud alert lasts for one year, seven if requested and you meet specific requirements. A freeze locks your credit so that credit applications are denied until/unless you unfreeze your credit.

To place a fraud alert or freeze, contact any of the three credit reporting agencies:

• Equifax – 800.685.1111 or www.equifax.com
• Experian – 888.397.3742 or www.experian.com
• Transunion – 800.916.8800 or www.transunion.com

KEEP AN EYE OUT FOR UNUSUAL EMAILS, TEXT MESSAGES OR PHONE CALLS

Keep an eye out for any unusual emails, text messages or phone calls, especially if they appear to come from the State of Washington or your financial institution. These could be social engineering attempts from hackers. Verify that the communication is legitimate by calling the organization back through an official phone number – one from the back of your credit or debit card or the agency’s website directory.

CHECK YOUR CREDIT REPORT

Obtain your free annual credit report at https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/articles/0155-free-credit-reports

Check your credit report for errors or fraudulent activity. Report anything suspicious to the credit bureau and the organization that provided the information to the bureau. You can now check your report every week (through April 2021).

CONSIDER FILING YOUR TAXES EARLY

Get a jump on your taxes to prevent a scammer from using your Social Security number to file a fraudulent return. If you’ve already filed, the IRS will flag the second return as suspicious. If you wait, yours could be the one that gets flagged.

For more information from the Office of the Washington State Auditor (SAO), click here. To learn more about our recommended steps to protect yourself from fraud, click here.

*Note: This FAQ comes from the Office of the Washington State Auditor*

Frequently asked questions regarding a data breach at SAO’s third-party service provider:

Q: When will I know whether my personal information was involved in this data breach? How will I find out, and what will happen after that?

A: Personal notifications directly to people whose data was involved will begin soon. SAO is continuing to work with its insurance company and legal counsel on these direct notifications. Although we do not have a firm date right now, SAO is doing everything in its power to have this process begin quickly.

In the meantime, SAO has set up a webpage dedicated to providing the latest information on this incident. Please go to sao.wa.gov/breach2021.

Q: Will this incident, which involved people’s unemployment information, affect the status or processing of their unemployment claims?

A: The Employment Security Department (ESD) does not yet know if the data breach will affect benefit payments. The agency is advising people to continue to submit weekly claims as usual. ESD’s claim system was not involved in this incident. Additionally, if there is something affecting your benefit payment, please check your eServices account for alerts. ESD will notify you of any new issues affecting your benefit claims.

Q: Remind me again: What files were affected?

A: The investigation is ongoing. Here is some of the data we believe was affected:

Personal information of people who filed for unemployment claims from Jan. 1 to Dec. 10, 2020. In addition to members of the general public, this group includes many state employees, as well as people whose identity was used to file for claims fraudulently in early 2020. The data involves about 1.6 million claims and included the person’s name, social security number and/or driver’s license or state identification number, bank information, date of birth and place of employment. Personal information of a smaller number of people, including data held by the Department of Children, Youth and Families. Non-personal financial information and other data from local governments and state agencies.

Q: Why can’t you tell us more about what information was involved?

A: The identities and information of individual people are contained in voluminous data files. We are working diligently to extract the identification and information about each person who was affected. We will provide the right information to the right people at the right time. We are doing our best to balance the need for transparency and the need for security. We are committed to sharing all that we can when it is appropriate.

Q: Why was SAO in possession of the ESD data?

A: SAO was reviewing all claims data as part of an audit of a fraud incident that occurred at ESD in early 2020. Auditing in all its forms requires us to handle sensitive information – some financial, some personal. We strongly believe our work, and our access to that data, has helped improve government for Washingtonians.

Q: Have the police or other authorities been notified?

A: Yes. Appropriate law enforcement agencies have been notified. Our primary concern is making sure this incident is fully investigated, and we don’t want to do anything to jeopardize that.