My coworker recently participated in a UEI (unemployment hearing) case for a woman who is...well, hard to describe. I think the facts about to be laid out will demonstrate she is best described as ‘not a great defense attorney.’
For those of you who are not familiar with such things, unemployment hearings are a not an uncommon occurrence and not nearly as dramatic as they sound. Our involvement in a UEI, as expected, starts when a former contractor with our agency starts an application to receive unemployment benefits. The reason he/she is no longer employed with our agency varies: fired, quit, resigned, whatever. In any case, once the application for benefits is received by The Unemployment Office of Whatever, they send us a notice that someone is filing for unemployment, and we put together the information as to why we should not have to pay out.
[Sidebar: Conceptually, there may be a world wherein we agree we should pay the applicant unemployment, but you can imagine those cases are few and far between and have no entertainment value whatsoever.]
When all details are gathered from both sides, a clerk of some kind sets up a hearing, which is, in practice, a conference call between us, the former contractor, and an assigned judge. The judge goes through a list of questions, both sides present their arguments, and the call ends. Both parties are notified of the verdict a week later. Done and done.
[Pro Tip: It is not mandatory to participate. It is, however, a most excellent idea to be present so you can argue your case, otherwise the other party will run away with the win. In addition, Yours Truly believes that judges have a greater tendency to deny unemployment benefits if the applicant doesn’t show up for the hearing. I can’t really argue. If you can't be bothered to show up for the hearing to talk about why you deserve money from the state, the state isn’t going to go out of its way to pay you. Said another way: if you have even the slightest interest in getting paid, show up.]
Yours Truly has been a part of two hearings in all the years I've been a recruiter (two is incredibly low and something of which I am very proud, mind you), so I’m no expert. Of the two, neither of the former contractors participated in the call, and neither applicant ended up with a check in the mail the next week.
But I digress. Moving on.
My coworker participated in the aforementioned UEI hearing for a woman who was ended at Client X for a reason I cannot recall and is utterly irrelevant. What is relevant is that we did discuss another assignment with this woman after her Client X assignment ended, effectively checking to see if she would be interested in being considered for Client Q. The woman responded, "I worked there in the past and hated it. I don't want to go back." Alrighty then. That was the end of that conversation. We didn't have anything else with which to match her at the time, so we marked her as available and moved on with our lives until she submitted an application for unemployment benefits.
Not having been present on the phone call, I admit to having only one side of the story as reported by my coworker, but even the partial facts are juicy enough to warrant repeating:
The applicant asserted she did not receive texts from us after a comment was brought forth that we had texted her regarding Client Q's assignment. My coworker, having done her homework to prepare for the hearing, told the judge that we had texted back and forth with the woman no fewer than three hundred and something times in the past not-quite-four years and had the date and time stamps to prove it. Suffice to say, the judge was suitably convinced.
After discussing the fact that the applicant had "worked there [Client Q] in the past and hated it, and that she didn't want to go back," the woman got very upset and said that we "should've pushed her more to consider the assignment."
I'm pretty sure my mouth dropped open when my coworker told me the woman said it was our responsibility to have pushed her to consider the Client Q assignment more. Why on earth would a grown-ass woman assume that it is our responsibility to push her into an assignment? We. Are. Not. Your. Parents. What do people not understand about that? We expect you to adult. This means:
Go to work when you're assigned.
Understand what it is in a job that you want (schedule, pay, location, type of work, etc.).
Turn down a job you don’t want.
Don't come crying back to us later asking for that same job or blaming us for not pushing you toward that job harder when you initially declined it. If we push you into a job that you don't want to accept and it doesn't work out, that's on us for offering you a poorly-suited assignment and usually means we'll lose an unemployment hearing.
I’m not quite ready to walk back my Pro Tip that it is always better to show up at your own unemployment hearing, but this woman comes very close to making me reconsider. Is it really necessary that I supplement my guidance with “oh, and don’t tell the judge that someone should have forced me to take that job”? Oh, to have been a fly on the wall of that judge's office. I like to imagine the look on his face would've been priceless. His judgement certainly suggested he wasn't overly impressed with her compelling argument.
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