State Agencies

First, I want to state that I'm not here to whine or complain. I'm here to express my opinions and share experiences that my friends and I have experienced as a learning tool.

Today's discussion will be about the Louisiana Unemployment Office and their strange procedures. I have a friend that was recently laid off from the company I work for. She received a severance package and a promise that she would be allowed to file unemployment. The problem started when she got her pink slip, yes my company believes in handing out a real pink slip, and proceeded to the Unemployment Office. She was told that she didn't need to give them the pink slip but to just call a number and register her unemployment. It seems that even though the Unemployment Office has employees, they prefer to have you talk to an automated system. She applied for her Unemployment and as a person of character she disclosed by law how much severence she would receive. She received a letter explaining that she would receive $258 a week but it would not be paid for almost 8 weeks due to her receiving a severence. The funny part is that with a severence they take out taxes for the year which is about 26 to 30% so the company deducted almost $700 from her paycheck. When she tried to explain to the Unemployment Office this fact, she was told that they look at the gross amount not the net. I disagree with this philosophy since I don't recall anyone paying bills with the gross amount of their paychecks. Due to this irrational error with our state government, this lady with 2 children will have to stretch a $1,000 for 7 weeks before she receives her first unemployment check. Hopefully and God willing she will find another job before that so she will be able to provide for her family. My issue is that if she wouldn't have been so honest, then she would have received payments within 2 to 4 weeks. I think it is an abomination that our government system punishes us for being honest. I also believe whomever came up with the idea to look at the gross income has never been without a job. I've told her that she needs to contact our Louisiana Senators, Congress, Governor, or all of the above to see if they understand why this is happening in one of their state agencies. I just hope that I'm never out of a job if this is the experience waiting for me.