ESC offices slammed; frustration abounds

RALEIGH -- As joblessness climbs, the N.C. Employment Security Commission is being swamped, often leading to long lines, delays and frustration.

Those seeking benefits are encountering busy signals, slow Internet connections and three- and four-hour waits at local offices.

Some people are first-time filers with questions about the process. Some are filing necessary paperwork. And others are there seeking help finding a job.

"There's like 10 workers and a million people they're trying to help," Lovann McDade said Friday. The Raleigh resident was laid off from her job at a local call center in September.

On Friday, McDade waited at the Raleigh ESC office from 11:45 a.m. until about 3:30 p.m., a wait that she said was actually not too long compared with other days.

"I stayed from 9 to 4 one day," she said. "Sometimes I would have to get up and leave to be home before my son gets home from school."

ESC spokesman Larry Parker said the agency's 88 offices, its telephone hot line and its Web site have been extremely busy in the past few months, despite the addition of 200 temporary employees. Now the agency employs about 1,600 people statewide, though Parker said he does not know of any plans to hire additional employees.

"It's a sign of the times," he said. "We are doing the best we can."

The agency's Web site is getting up to 80,000 hits a day, nearly four times the volume of 18 months ago.

Last fall, commission officials said there was a backlog of as many as 17,000 unemployment benefit claims waiting for verification. The ESC has since caught up, meaning that while cases might pile up during the week, they are usually processed before the week is out, ESC spokesman Andy James said.

Still, "unfortunately, we do get complaints," he said. "We don't have the money to put in all the people we need, and we don't have the money to put in all the phone lines we need."

The commission does get additional federal funding in tough times, but "that's never enough," James said. "We are seeing record numbers of everything."

Some benefit-seekers are strategic about their in-person visits.

Margaret Petrie, who lives in Raleigh and was laid off from her job with a catalog company in June, said the ESC office is often crowded and loud.

"What they need is an intercom system," she said. "You can hardly hear. People are missing their names being called."

Even workers who have had some leads find it tough to actually secure a job, Petrie added. She was offered one job at a call center, but she doesn't own a car, and the hours she had to work were not ones during which there is bus service.

Steve Westbrook, a 61-year-old from Raleigh, was laid off from his job as a salesman of financial services in March.

Westbrook said he was able to dodge into the Raleigh office Friday afternoon and get his question answered in about 10 minutes.

"Usually it's a zoo in here, but timing is everything," he said.

(Kirsten Valle of The Charlotte Observer contributed to this report.)