MT Unemployment

To Whom It May Concern;

Thank you for approval for unemployment benefits. Your graciousness is beyond appreciated. (I'll refrain from commenting about how I've worked for 10 freakin years for the same company and SHOULD be approved. But that's neither here nor there.)

I'm writing in regards to your "easy to use" website and telephone service. So far I've had two very important questions that your "easy to use" website was unable to answer. After calling your telephone service for 4 days and only receiving a busy signal, I finally got through moments before I was supposed to walk into an appointment. Subsequently, I waited on hold for no less than 18 minutes before being sent to a representative. While the representative was quite pleasant, she was unable to adequately answer my first question, and reported the website would also be of no help. Lovely. She recommended I attempt to request my bi-weekly benefits and "see what happens."

In order to streamline things, I decided to try to get my second question answered through another authority (who is required to sign your certificates in order for me to receive bi-weekly monetary benefits). I was directed and re-directed to 7 people, none of whom were able to answer my question. So, I went back to your ever-helpful website, read through almost every single page, all to no avail. Consequently, I dialed your telephone service. Thus far, I've been on hold for 27 minutes and 45 seconds....

Might I suggest you take a direct approach to attempt to lower the Montana Unemployment rate by staffing more representatives? This will not only decrease the amount of money Montana pays to unemployed individuals, but will also likely decrease the number of death threats you receive daily. Two birds, one stone.

Might I also suggest you change your automatic, on-hold recordings to reflect the following: "We are sorry we are unable to answer your call in a timely manner. Your call will not be answered shortly. We hope you have enough cell phone minutes to cover the timeframe you'll continue to be on hold. Should you lose patience, please feel free to peruse our website. It is not user-friendly, and you will likely lose patience with this as well. Please understand this is our attempt to lower the Montana unemployment rate. The more of you who commit suicide trying to receive benefits will lower our call volume and the amount of benefits we pay out. Thank you for your call, have a pleasant day."

I personally find honesty and tact go a long way with people. I hope you'll consider my suggestions.

Sincerely,
One of your Victims