Senator asks director to resign over Florida’s unemployment fiasco

Tampa Bay Times ^ | April 3, 2020 | Lawrence Mower

[4Runner]

Florida’s unemployment system has been overwhelmed by a record number of people thrown out of work because of the coronavirus. Its website, the primary way to apply for unemployment, brings up error messages more often than not. Its call center, meant to be a backup system for the website, has been overwhelmed with callers, and some people are spending up to 12 hours on hold, if they’re able to get through at all.

[4Runner]

In 2014 Florida spent $77 million on a "new" website design which from day one of its rollout was plagued with systemic failure. What no one wants to disclose and has forgotten is that the IT used to create the website was an offshore product. This was around the time when Bill Gates was spending billions in India creating a caste of IT "professionals" to serve the IT industry's economic purposes. Chickens coming home to roost.

[PeteB570]

NC has an on line system that sucks.

Future S-I-L got laid off and started the on line application but was given the wrong form from the company and was denied.

Tried to correct - but the system says he’s filed already.

Tried to call and spends 6 hours on hold and then his call is dropped. Repeat a couple of times and then the office is closed for the day - then repeat the next day.

Can’t go in person because the offices are closed to non workers.

[jeffc]

Umm... 12 hours? Who in their right mind would spend 12 hours on hold?

Oh, wait. This is Floriduh....

[shelterguy]

Here in Minnesota they got about a thousand claims per week a year ago.

In the last two weeks they got over 300,000 claims.

Does anybody with over three brain cells not realize that there will be massive overload for awhile?

Everybody and every business is overwhelmed right now.

[ltc8k6]

It’s like announcing that everyone’s driver’s license is invalid and needs to be replaced, and then being shocked that the DMV is overwhelmed.

[Freedom'sWorthIt]

Not good.

Yet I heard from “friends” how well NC is going thanks to (Dem) governor Cooper.....

She needs to contact Senator Tillis.

[shelterguy]

Here is another huge part of it that no politician will dare talk about...Identity theft.

Let’s say Ed worked at the same place for 20 years and never filed for unemployment. Now he gets laid off due to the Chinese flu. He files online and the system should take care of it automatically with no human contact whatsoever.

But the system kicks out his claim because it shows he is already collecting unemployment in several states. It turns out that when Pedro came here illegally he bought some stolen Social Security numbers and used it to get a job.

Now Ed has to prove who he is and where he has worked for years. And until he does that he does not get the unemployment checks.

Identity theft by illegals is huge. Of course no politician will talk about it or do anything about it because that would be racist.

[GailA]

HOW much is entertainment industry? Knoxville up through Dollywood is basically food, gift shops, shows. No one is working that industry.

We need more Places that cater to Truckers, EMT, DR, NURSES. If you what cloth mask made reopen HOBBY LOBBY, but all none sewing items stored in back. Cotton fabric, thread, and iron on or sew in heavy Interfacing. X on floor for distance. credit card only. Joann’s needs a online ship to home same items. It’s all curb pick up.

BTW EASTER IS CANCELLED, Sunday, April 12.

[shelterguy]

Here in Minneapolis there is a Hobby Lobby that is closed because it is non essential. Right next door is a liquor store that is open. The parking lot is full. Go figure.

[georgiarat]

The way this works in state gotta is that a large state contracts for an IT system usually political pressure or under table influence. That company touts contract to other states (paid of politicians help behind the scenes) and system spreads even befor first state is up and operational.next state uses specs from first two for bidding that lean heavily to the IT firm. Happens constantly and by the time everyone realizes the system is crap several states are involved, embarrassed and go into cover mode.

Rinse and repeat with next new required system,

[EVO X]

Rinse and repeat with next new required system,

Also, they may not have factored in a worse case load. If you look at BLS figures for 2008-2009, the worst quarter for mass layoffs was a bit over 800K. We are up to ~10M in 2 weeks..

[torqemada]

POTUS said yesterday that he wanted Fed agencies to handle the unemployment situation, but the state governors (partiularly the Democrat ones) were having none of it. No doubt, they were hoping to get their hot little fingers on those billions in hopes of siphoning off some of it. Surprise, surprise...if their citizens can’t get through their broken state system to file a claim, the state won’t get the funding they need to pay those claims if/when they get their bureaucratic incompetence straightened out.