NOVEMBER 8, 2002 – Under siege with calls to a Michigan hotline for jobless workers, staff will be skipping the Veteran’s Day holiday Monday to help customers.

“We’ve had a high volume of calls recently and we wanted to show our commitment to customer service by keeping the Hotline open this holiday, even though most state workers will be off Monday,” said Noelle Clark, director of the Department of Consumer & Industry Services that oversees the Bureau of Workers’ & Unemployment Compensation (BW&UC). “I commend the customer service representatives who volunteered to work.”

The BW&UC’s Claimant Customer Relations Hotline will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Veteran’s Day. The toll-free number is 1-800-638-3995. Hotline staff answers caller questions about the claims process and other aspects of the unemployment insurance system. In many cases, staff helps speed up the payment of benefits to idled workers.

To handle an overflow of calls to the Hotline, its hours were expanded indefinitely to 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. weekdays. The old Hotline hours were 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. weekdays. The Hotline is normally closed for State holidays.

As another customer convenience, BW&UC recently introduced a toll-free number for another phone service for jobless workers: MARVIN – the interactive voice response system. MARVIN, an automated workhorse who can be reached at 1-866-638-3993 from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. weekdays, also will take calls on Veteran’s Day, as usual.