am I the only one who thinks it's ridiculous we have to contact the governor to get basic unemployment services? the whole system is a joke. they expect people to wait months with no income while bills pile up? what are families supposed to do?

UPDATE: We got APPROVED!!! All 6 weeks processed and payment is pending direct deposit! Should have the money tomorrow. The adjudicator never even called us - just verified with the employer and made the determination. Thank you everyone for your support and advice during this stressful time. And definitely reach out to the governor's office if you're stuck - it made all the difference for us.

Wait i'm confused... if you're not looking for work right now why even worry about the appeal? You said you stopped filing claims because you're not job hunting anymore, so you wouldn't be eligible for benefits anyway at this point, right? Or are you hoping to get retroactive payments for those 8 weeks you claimed after quitting?

One last thing to consider: if your appeal is successful and you get benefits for those 8 weeks, that could trigger an overpayment notice for any benefits you received after your contract job ended, if those were calculated on a new claim. ESD might determine you were double-dipping (using the same employment hours for two different benefit periods). This is why understanding if your contract job created a new benefit year is so important.

I had a similar reduction in hours situation in 2024 and also had my denial reversed by OAH. Just so you know what happened in my case: I got the full written decision about 5 days after seeing the 'reversed' status online. Then I had to wait about 18 days before the money actually showed up in my account. ESD's system takes time to implement the judge's decision. One weird thing - my eServices account showed 'adjudication in progress' again for about a week during this time, which freaked me out, but it was just part of their process of implementing the decision. Hang in there!

Quick follow-up: if you don't see any changes in your eServices portal within 2 weeks, you might need to contact ESD to ensure they're implementing the judge's decision. Sometimes there can be delays if they're backlogged. But in most cases, once OAH reverses a decision, ESD processes the claim within 10-14 business days. Just keep documenting all your job search activities while waiting!

I'm actually an employer but I've helped employees with this before. The rule is you need 680 hours in your new base year AND you must have returned to work and earned 6 times your weekly benefit amount since opening your previous claim. If you meet both requirements, you can file immediately without waiting for your benefit year to expire. If not, you'll need to wait until after November 9th.

Just wanted to mention that when you apply, make sure to have your employment info from your new job ready - especially your start and end dates and reason for separation. They'll verify this with your employer. Also, the first week is still a waiting week where you won't get paid - that never changed back after COVID.

My brother got in BIG trouble with L&I cause they saw facebook pics of him volunteering at a community garden while claiming he couldnt work!!! they made him pay back like $6000!!! be careful what u post online too!!!

One final piece of advice: when you do get hold of your claim manager, ask them to document the conversation in your file. Get their email address and follow up with a summary of what was discussed. L&I claims can sometimes change hands, and having that paper trail of you actively seeking guidance shows you're acting in good faith.