Long Islanders Stuck In Unemployment Limbo; New System Enacted

BAY SHORE, NY — As unemployment claims surged to unprecedented levels in New York due to coronavirus, some Long Islanders spent days and weeks in limbo, trying to finalize their applications. On Thursday, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced a new system would launch at 7:30 a.m. Friday, eliminating the second step of the process that has proven to be a major obstacle for those filing: waiting for a Department of Labor callback after submitting the online application.

The new website, powered by Google, was meant to help stem the backlog of a flood of new applications, and will now direct applicants to wait for one of 1,000 call center staff members to call them back within 72 hours. But as of Friday morning the system seemed to still be causing confusion and not fully streamlined, according to Long Islanders who have spent days trying to file.

Dawn Strain owns an event production company on Long Island called DJS Events. She told Patch that she spent five days trying to complete the online portion of the application and even when it went through on Friday morning, the instructions still indicated she should call New York State Department of Labor.

"All I get is a busy signal or a recording that states they are experiencing high call volume and to call back another time. "

As the coronavirus pandemic triggered wide scale layoffs and business retractions throughout the month of March, the state Department of Labor's website was overwhelmed. A Cuomo aide told the New York Post that the state had processed about 600,000 unemployment filings since March 9, with another 200,000 pending, a tenfold increase over normal rates.

But those numbers only count those who were able to get through and file through the overworked website. Matthew Williams of Bay Shore has been trying to file electronically for unemployment since March 13, he said.

"I finished the question portion with the automotive system on the phone. Says it will transfer me to a claims representative to finish the claim. But every time it just hangs up."

"It's extremely rough at this point," trying to pay his expenses with the lag time between losing his job at an entertainment company and receiving benefits.

Williams estimates he called over a thousand times to try to complete the process.