Hello,
I need your help to elevate my case with IDES.
I started out this pandemic with what’s referred to as a 601/602/603 Requalification which resulted in me waiting one hundred and thirteen days to receive benefits from the start of the pandemic. Due to the continued failure of IDES, at this (hopefully) tail end of the pandemic, I have now been waiting one hundred and three days in this lapse of benefits since mid-December.
I’ve spent the majority of the pandemic not receiving benefits from the state, despite fulfilling all eligibility and certification requirements.
I work with IATSE Local 2 as a union stagehand for live events. As I’m you’re aware, my entire industry is out of work as we await the rise of vaccinations and lifting of venue capacity restrictions.
I have had to publicly beg my friends and family to help me make rent. Considering that I’ve had to make three GoFundMe’s for this exact purpose, it’s no surprise that the most recent one didn’t meet it’s goal. Check them out.
As a constituent of Illinois, being affected by the continual underfunding, mismanagement, outdated software, and frankly confusing and often conflicting communication of IDES, this is what I have needed to do to make it through the past year.
Here's the exact, boiled-down issue that could be resolved with a callback from a higher-level manager:
I didn’t qualify for a certain period of Extended Benefits that would’ve allowed me to be placed on the PEUC extension. I applied for PUA before the extension was passed, so my standard UI claim expired and went inactive, and I was also denied PUA. I need an agent to reactivate my old claim, manually certify weeks from December 23rd on, and deactivate my PUA. I have continued to certify on the PUA website, as I have not been able to work or find work.
I’m now waiting for the fourth callback which may or may not resolve my issue. What happened with the first three, you may ask? Well,
I was able to connect to an agent and describe my issue, as well as (at the time) I was concerned about updating IDES with my legal name change. I waited a total of two hours holding between two levels of supervisors, only for the highest level person to call me back three days later, where they were only able to give me information about the name change. The issue with certification and payment remained unchanged. I re-queued.
I connected to an agent, described my issue, and waited an hour and a half to be transferred to the next level of supervisor. After explaining my issue to this supervisor, and them taking a few minutes to look over my account, the call disconnected. Unsure if they hung up, or if the call was dropped. Either way, I waited a few days, and there was no attempt to reconnect. I re-queued.
I picked up the phone, and over the course of two minutes there was dead air – I assume that there was some failure with the line-switching service they use. I would be incredibly surprised if that tech was created or implemented any later than 2005.
Keep in mind that there’s about three weeks between these three. I have no way of knowing if I’m even still in the callback queue, or if that last not-connected call counted! I fear calling again in case it would reset my potential position in the queue, and I cannot afford to wait another month without having to break my lease and crash on a friend’s couch.
Please, elevate my case with your contact at IDES so this can be solved quickly. I cannot live like this for much longer.
For your use, this is the personal information on file with IDES. As I mentioned, I’m in the middle of a legal name change, and despite submitting proper documentation they haven’t been able to update my name, so this is what’s on file.
Tyler King
3812 N Pine Grove Ave #411
Chicago IL 60613
Claimant ID: 6252931
Please help me. Call or text as necessary.
-Olive
they/she
c. 540.903.4707