California unemployment backlog reaches highest level in months

CENTRAL COAST, Calif. (KION) California's unemployment backlog is at its highest at more than 900,000 claims.

The EDD has added an additional step requesting applicants to verify their identity to prevent possible fraud. This has caused a delay for many to claim unemployment.

"They want to try to not receive fraud, but it's harder for people," said Yesmin Arevalo, owner of Laurel Tax & immigration Service.

This year EDD stopped payments to more than one million accounts to prevent fraud. The identity verification process was later implemented and is expected to be completed within 30 days. Online, over the phone and fax are the three ways to verify.

Mary Bravo tried to apply for unemployment in November. However, she was not able to complete the claim.

"Its really stressful, because I needed unemploymet,"said Bravo. "I had everything, all of my documents were okay. But I couldnt pass the verification, I dont know why."

She wasnt the only one in her family that couldnt get through the verifcation road bloack. Bravo's dad also applied in November. He submitted an application and recieved a confirmation email. He had to wait for a letter in the mail that never arrived.

"The day that they answered, they told him that the first appilcation wasn't recieved," said Bravo. " So we had to do a new application again. We did it online and he didnt pass the application process."

Since the pandemic, Arravalo has received more clients than ever. She says it's been very difficult to see her clients go through this process.

"It's an extra step, they need to put more information," said Arravalo. "It's harder, people spend more than two hours on the line trying to speak with someone with the EDD."