Wagner-Peyser Act

Assistance to Unemployment Insurance Claimants and Other Unemployed Individuals

In Florida, most Reemployment Assistance claimants are registered as job seekers in Employ Florida within 24 hours of filing for unemployment benefits. This is accomplished through an automated interface between the unemployment compensation system and Employ Florida. Each night, new Reemployment Assistance claimant information is sent to Employ Florida where a basic registration is created. This includes the client’s email address and a partial work history, if supplied. The career services skills matching functionality of Employ Florida is used to generate an initial listing of current jobs posted in the system based on the employment information given by claimants when filing claims.

This generates an automatic email to the claimant that:

• Informs the claimant of his/her Employ Florida login information;

• Provides a link to the initial list of jobs matching the claimant’s employment history; and

• Provides the link the claimant to complete a full résumé and begin active use of the system to search and apply for jobs.

This information is immediately available to staff who use it to contact claimants to provide information about available career center services. The claimant’s skills information automatically becomes available to employers seeking specific candidates to fill job openings.

Florida requires all claimants filing an initial online Reemployment Assistance claim to complete a full work registration in Employ Florida prior to receiving benefit payments. The full work registration requires the claimant to create an individual account. This account includes demographic information, an email address attached to the Employ Florida account, and a complete background wizard which collects education, employment and skills information and allows the claimant/job seeker to post a résumé. The full registration process provides LWDBs with integral information with which to target reemployment services to claimants and job seekers. Some claimants elect to complete an online skills assessment available to individuals seeking Reemployment Assistance and job services. The skills assessment measures an individual’s skills, abilities and career aptitude. LWDBs use results obtained from the assessment to provide a customized and tiered level of service. Higher scores or results from the assessment may indicate the claimant is equipped with skills to seek jobs and obtain employment before his or her benefits expire. These individuals require less staff intervention. Lower scores typically indicate a claimant may require more intensive staff intervention before being job ready.

Worker Profiling and Reemployment Services (WPRS)/Priority Reemployment Planning (PREP) Program Florida’s reemployment services are centered on the Priority Reemployment Planning (PREP) Program, the state’s Worker Profiling and Reemployment Services effort which is operational statewide. A PREP pool consisting of Reemployment Assistance claimants is created on a weekly basis from initial reemployment claims filed during that week. Prior to the transfer into Employ Florida, the following factors are used in the profiling methodology to determine those individuals most likely to exhaust their benefits based on: tenure with their most recent employment, education level, total unemployment rate in the local labor market, last occupation being one of the occupations most in decline (O*NET) and Standard Occupational Classification (SOC). Excluded from the PREP pool are:

• Claimants whose program identification is other than intrastate claimant;

• Interstate claimant;

• Transitional claimant;

• Claimants on recall status within eight weeks of filing their claim; and

• Claimants with a first payment issued more than 42 days after the benefit year beginning date.

Claimants are placed in the PREP pool on the fourth week of their claims for early intervention purposes.

A group assessment interview and the development of a service plan, if necessary, are coupled with the orientation service. Based on the service plan, the following services are made available for claimants who are not job ready: job search workshops, testing, counseling, specific labor market information and referral to education and or training.

Reemployment Services and Eligibility Assessment (RESEA) Grant
In 2016, Florida shifted to the Reemployment Services and Eligibility Assessment (RESEA) program where the target populations changed to all transitioning veterans receiving assistance and claimants most likely to exhaust RA benefits.

The RESEA program addresses the reemployment needs of RA claimants most likely to exhaust benefits and transitioning veterans receiving unemployment for ex-service members (UCX). The program provides specific intensive services to these populations and helps detect and prevent erroneous Unemployment Insurance (UI) payments. The RESEA program uses a one-on-one intensive appointment process.

Each RESEA participant receives:

• An orientation about the career center’s services;

• An initial assessment to determine the claimant’s strengths, weaknesses and barriers to employment;

• Labor market information unique to the participant’s past or future occupation and work experience. If the labor market information shows the participant’s occupation to be in decline, he or she may be referred for training;

• An Employability Development Plan developed jointly by career center staff and the claimant;

• Referral to at least one work-search activity such as résumé writing or an interviewing workshop; and

• Referral to training, if needed.

Consistent with Section 443.091, Florida Statutes, failure to appear as directed for reemployment services at the appointed career center may affect a participant’s eligibility for benefits and services. There is a feedback loop to the Reemployment Assistance Program for RESEA participants who miss their initial appointment. Reemployment Assistance adjudicators review the reason for the participant’s failure to report to the career center and if there are no extenuating circumstances (such as moving out of state, returned to work, etc.), issue a determination of ineligibility. The determination of ineligibility includes a disqualification for the week in which the claimant failed to report for reemployment services. When an assessment is completed, an automatic notice is generated and sent to the Reemployment Assistance Program to conduct an eligibility review questionnaire to determine the claimant’s eligibility for continued Reemployment Assistance benefits.