ATLANTA — Georgia’s labor commissioner says the state is doing a good job of distributing unemployment benefits, despite complaints from many applicants.
The pandemic drove the unemployment rate in Georgia and some of those affected said they have not received benefits for months.
"The computer system there seems like it's just stuck in the Stone Age," said bartender Daniel Song.
Song said the bar where he worked closed during the pandemic. He said his unemployment benefits abruptly stopped in July.
"When I filed an appeal back in July, they'd say there would be a response in 10-to-12 days," he said. "I wasn't really expecting 10-to-12 days. But it's been months and months now."
He said he has not received an answer to repeated inquiries to the Georgia Department of Labor.
"Not even an email," he said. "Absolutely nothing."
Song worked at Joystick Gamebar with Adam Cable, who said he has had a similar experience.
"I spent hours and hours, just calling and calling and calling," Cable said. "No response. No nothing."
Their employer, Johnny Martinez, said he filed the unemployment paperwork on their behalf with the state Department of Labor.
For some laid-off employees, Martinez said the Labor Department responded and made timely payments. But for others, the Department of Labor was curiously unresponsive.
"We have faxed in our information. We have emailed our information," Martinez said. "We have left voicemails. We have spoken to real people -- all of which have wanted to be helpful, but no one has an answer or a solution."
Georgia Labor Commissioner Mark Butler says the vast majority of unemployment claims are getting processed.
"Even if you get it right 95, 99 percent of the time, you’re still talking about tens of thousands of individuals who have some kind of issue on their claims," Butler said.
"It goes back to the volume," he added. "You're obviously not going to be able to get to every one of those people every single day" -- when their cases are complicated.
"The system itself, is incredibly complicated," Martinez said. "They do not make it easy for someone to get their benefits."
Yet, Martinez acknowledges it’s not supposed to be too easy. He says he regularly gets wind of fraudulent unemployment claims made by people he’s never heard of, claiming they lost their jobs at his workplaces.