My Life in Pictures - Waiting On Hold - Don't you know there's a recession going on?

The Massachusetts unemployment department offices are recommending that you stand outside the building before the office opens in order to get in to file a claim.

When I called the local office earlier they had closed the doors because they had 40 people waiting.

The last few times I called the phone center to file a claim instead of walking in I received an automated message telling me to call back later.

It's been this way since I got laid off.

I've been trying to file my claim for over a month.

Today, I finally got through to the hold queue.

My expected hold time is approximately 87 minutes.

Since I have no speakerphone I taped the computer mic to the phone so I don't have to hold it to my ear for 87 minutes.





So, yeah. A lot of people are unemployed.

This could be much faster if there was a way to file my claim online. However, the MA Unemployment Department website is a pile of snakes and when you get to the point where you can finally claim online, you get an error telling you that you can't actually file a claim "for security purposes."

When I was in Oregon, all I had to do was go online to workinginoregon.org, spend ten minutes filling out the form, and then go on about my day.

Heck, you could even use their automated phone tree to file your claim.

In MA, I have to wait on hold for at least an hour and a half, or stand outside the office building at eight in the morning waiting for the office to open to file a claim.

In case you're trying to file a claim yourself, here is the sequence of keys to push on the phone:

2 1 1 [input social security number] 1 [4 digit date of birth] 1 1

NOTE:  There will be two points in the phone tree where you will be prompted to call back later, followed by a seven second pause, before the prompts continue.

Edit: I finally got through and filed my claim and they totally pulled some Wizard of Oz shit on me.

Remember when you were a kid and you saw the Wizard of Oz movie the first time and you got to the end and when Dorothy asks the Good Witch Glenda why she didn't tell her how to get home and the Witch tells her "you didn't ask?" Remember how you wanted to punch her in the head so goddamn bad because not only did Dorothy ask, she practically begged?

Well, when I filed my claim, at the end of the call I said "so I'm going to get retro-paid for all the time I've been trying to get into the employment office or get someone on the phone, right?"

And the guy on the phone says "no you have to ask for that."

So I said, "what? No, I shouldn't have to ask for that, you should ask me that!"


I said "why didn't you ask me that before?"

The guy said "I don't have to ask. You should ask."

I mean holy cow, when you have to wait in a line of forty people and the call center is so busy sometimes they don't even have a line for you to hold on, why would you not ask every single person if they wanted to get paid for all the time they've spent waiting to file their claim if that option is available?

So because I asked for that money at the end of the call, he had to start filing the claim all over again and I got to wait with dead air while he typed.

And oh gosh, the guy spoke so slowly. And made me repeat myself over and over because he couldn't understand the words I was saying to him.

This call went from 1:00pm to 3:00pm including hold time.