Major Changes Made In CT's New Unemployment System: 5 Things To Know

CONNECTICUT — The state Department of Labor unveiled its new and modernized unemployment filing system today that had been six years in the making.

The new cloud-based system replaces a 40-year-old mainframe based system, which struggled to handle a mountain of unemployment claims at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Gov. Ned Lamont hailed the new system as an important step to bring state government into the 21st century.

"This is part of our overall effort as we continue to try and modernize our state government," Lamont said.

The state Department of Motor Vehicles and business registration system have modernized some of their systems as well. Many vehicle license and registration renewals can be completed online. The state also unveiled a one-stop website for business registrations, licenses, permits and taxes.

Here are five things to know about the new unemployment system:

How much did the new system cost?

The new system cost $60 million to implement, $35 million of which came from the federal government, DOL Commissioner Dante Bartolomeo said.

How many people have registered to use the new system?

About 20,000 weekly unemployment filers have registered with the new system over the course of a day.

"Claimants have until Saturday to file for the week ending July 2, 2022," the state DOL said in a statement. "If a claimant did not file a weekly certification on June 26, 2022, they may also file for that week, as well."

How is the new system better than the old one?

The new system is cloud-based, and additional servers can be brought online immediately if there is a large traffic spike. There is a single sign-on, so users don’t have to remember multiple usernames and passwords.

Some employers could see as much as a 75 percent decrease in paperwork filings, Bartolomeo said. ReEmployCT is a single system instead of CT DOL’s five-part system. Tech improvements will help with data analysis.

The old system had some severe limitations, such as only taking applications during certain times of the day. It was initially only able to handle maximum weekly payments of $999, which became problematic when the federal government enhanced benefits by $600 near the start of the pandemic, Bartolomeo said.

The old system was also only able to take 8,300 daily initial unemployment applications. The system froze March 16, 2020, after a deluge of claims.

How old is Connecticut’s previous system?

Connecticut was using a legacy 40-year-old system to process unemployment claims. The aging system was overwhelmed in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, when claims increased 20-fold. Processing delays reached three weeks.

"We like to joke, but it's not so much a joke, it's held together with duct tape," Bartolomeo said.

Connecticut’s old system (which was actually five separate systems) ran largely on the COBOL programming language. DOL recruited COBOL programmers to help integrate enhanced federal unemployment benefits into the system.

Connecticut wasn’t alone in dealing with an inflexible unemployment system. New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy said COBOL engineers were needed along with healthcare workers during the early months of the pandemic.

How long was the upgrade in the works?

The state DOL first contemplated an upgrade in the 1980s. A formalized effort began in 2016, Bartolomeo said.

The pandemic caused a delay to the new system switchover, since much effort had to be decided to keep the old system running.