UI Appeal GA-Lost job due to a domestic violence situation.

[beth1818]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Georgia

I am having to fill out an appeal for UI in Georgia. I was terminated from my job because I was having to get a PTO from my Fiancee. I had been harassed by him while working and was unable to focus 100% on my job and had to miss work to go to court, etc. If there is any advice anyone can give me, I would greatly appreciate it.

 

[commentator]

Clarify please. You have already been terminated from your job. You have filed for your unemployment benefits, correct? You have received an initial decision, denying benefits for reason (---------?)and now you are given 15 days to file an appeal, correct? Is this the point you are at in your unemployment process? You have begun to certify for weeks as they pass, though you are not receiving any money. Is this the case? If so, it does not matter a bit what you "fill out" on the form requesting an appeal. All you need to do is get that thing in, saying nothing more than I WISH TO REQUEST AN APPEAL OF THIS DECISION. You do not need to make your case or give any sort of evidence or testimony in the request for an appeal. It just has to be submitted within the time frame. You will have a hearing, in which you will give your reason for appeal and present your case.

What was the actual reason that your company has terminated you? What do they say? Do they say absenteeism, violation of the company's attendance policy, or do they say it is because you had to get a PTO against your boyfriend, or because he had been coming to work harrassing you? Or was it for performance issues because you were not as you said, able to give 100% of your attention to the job? What you will need to say in your appeal is based on the reason the company gave for terminating you. In fact, it could be a combination of all these reasons, but they will have had to be very specific in the information they gave to the unemployment office. AND exactly what they said when they were telling you you had been terminated. This will affect how to proceed on your appeal.

If you have the option of requesting a telephone or in person hearing, it is usually advantageous to the claimant to request an in-person hearing, so I'd do that, if we're at that point in this process.

 

[beth1818]

We were to be married in April. In January his brother committed suicide. From that point on he just snapped. We were all in a state of shock. He would constantly call and email me at work. And when at home I was on edge. I worked at a doctor's office and my office manager was fully aware of the situation. It got so bad that I really thought he was going to kill me and I had to get a restraining order. That is also the date I was let go.

I applied for unemployment and was originally approved. Then I had to leave the state for my safety and during that time I received a letter stating I was actually denied. I missed my appeal date and was told to still submit one. I am finally back in GA and things have settled down.

The reason for my denial is absenteeism/tardiness with warning. (I had received my warning a week earlier.)

Decision code D10202.

I missed work for the restraining order and during the funeral.

I was told I need to ask for a late appeal and to include any evidence that I have. I have emails, court papers, everything from the moment that he started acting crazy till I was terminated.

Please let me know if I left anything out.

 

[beth1818]

I was given severance pay. I was terminated for substandard work quality and excessive lateness.

My warning was given to me 1 week earlier when I was late.

 

[commentator]

Beth1818, I think that Georgia did not accept the "domestic violence" aspect of the unemployment stimulus package, but I think that you can safely say that your problems at work were all due to a "personal emergency" of the domestic violence category.

You will submit the appeal, simply saying, "I request an appeal". At this point, as I said, someone should contact you from the DOL or you should receive notice of a hearing.

In any case, you have a fair to middling chance here. What you will state is that you had trouble at your work, including the lateness, due to your personal emergency, which was that your boyfriend had a melt down during this time, and that he became abusive and was stalking you, contacting you at work, holding and threatening you so that you were not able to come to work on time sometimes.

Say that you, and I hope you did this, tried to keep your employer fully informed about the problems you were experiencing and tried to work these problems out with your employer from the beginning of this situation. That you did not want to lose your job.

Do not say, "Well, I probably wasn't doing a very good job on my job." That's not going to get you approved as it sounds as though you were deliberately screwing up. Say instead that you did the job to the best of your abilities, though many things were going on in your life at this time and you were very stressed.

Also state that you are back in town, and that the situation has been resolved, that you did your best to keep your job, and that you are able and available to work now.

You will want to mention that you were with this company for x number of months, with good performance and no problems regarding lateness or any other issues, and that once this situation has been resolved, you feel that you will be able to go forward and work without any problems what so ever.

Good luck on this, there is some latitude built into the stimulus package and in some states for victims of domestic violence to appeal for their unemployment. Georgia does not seem to be one of these, but the attitudes of the whole system toward domestic violence situations is changing. I doubt if they can say your tardiness and any performance issues were genuine intentional misconduct on your part. Your role is to say you tried your best in a very difficult personal situation, and you did not voluntarily do tardiness or poor performance of any kind. Do not bring up any other work related issues such as his calling you or harrassing you on the job. If they bring them up, that's okay.

 

[beth1818]

Thank you so much. My office manager was fully aware of the situation the entire time. Thank you again for your time.