Being unemployed in this time of great financial uncertainty is not an uncommon thing. Depending on which state you live in there will different procedures to follow to make a claim for unemployment so you need to know what to do. Living in the state of Texas means that you will need to be aware of all of the procedures involved for unemployment benefits under Texas state law.
Texas unemployment
The state of Texas has instigated the “employment at will” policy which literally means that they expect any hiring or firing is done at will. What this basically means is that an employer is free to terminate the employment of any employee for a good, bad or even no reason at all. Similarly, the employee is free to strike, quit or in any other way stop working. Certain rules have to abided by though and these include allowing employees to partake in jury service when mandated to do so by the state and different forms of discrimination based upon the age of the employee, their gender or their race or original nationality. In addition to this, even though ‘at will’ states can hire and fire at will; the employers need to follow their own procedures and policies.
So how do you make sense of all this if you have lost your job? If you need to make an unemployment claim in Texas what do you do? Firstly you need to consider of you are qualified or not. You will only be entitled to make a benefit claim if you have had a regular paying job in the recent past and if you have never worked then you can’t make a claim. The reason for the termination of your employment should not have been for any gross misconduct or criminal activity. If you quit because you needed medical attention or been caught up in a downsizing exercise then you will be able to make a claim.
Texas unemployment
All unemployment claims in the state of Texas are handled by the TWC (the Texas Work Force Commission). They will require to know from you the date you commenced working for your employer and the date that your employment was terminated as well as the salary that you were earning. You will also be requested to give details of the number of hours that you worked each week. Using this information the commission will assess whether you qualify for unemployment benefit from the state.
Claims can be followed up on the TWC web site or by calling the office as you will not get an instant decision on your claim. The headquarters of the commission is located in Austin and there are five other sub offices. The TWC office has flexible hours and the phone lines are staffed from 7 am until the early evening which means that you have time to look for a job during the day before you visit the unemployment benefit office. These opening hours are designed to save you travelling costs and time.
As you would imagine, Texas unemployment benefit payments are decided by what the average cost of living in the state currently is. For instance, for a previous wage of $150,000 annually, you would get $392 every week where the cost of living is $59,000 or thereabouts in Texas.
If at any point, you are not in agreement with the decision of the Texas unemployment determination agent or even the state level hearing, then you are entitled to pursue this through the courts. If you get to the stage where you want to go to court over your Texas unemployment benefits claim, you must take help of a lawyer.
