After months of delays, Mass. unemployment officials finally respond — inside the broken system

For nearly a year, Boston 25 has been digging into delays at the state's unemployment office, asking why some of you were left waiting for weeks, even months, for answers or a paycheck. For the first time, the DOA is letting Boston 25's Elie Murillo inside the system to answer questions about those claim delays. Well, when did it become very loud that it's like, you know, we've got to address it? There was an adjustment period last summer combined with the peak season and so that combined really led to greater backlog than we were probably anticipating. Boston 25 reviewed federal data and found Massachusetts ranked last among states and territories nationwide for timely unemployment payments last year at the height of the backlog. In July of 2025, only about half of claimants were receiving benefits within 30 days. States with similar caseloads like Michigan and Oregon processed claims faster, while Florida had similar processing times during the same time period. New Jersey had nearly double the cases of the Bay State and cleared cases at 92.8%. We know that at the end of the day, data does matter and we are looking directly at how we can improve. Secretary of Labor and Workforce Development Lauren Jones sat down with me to talk about the issue. She says other states followed Massachusetts its lead when it came to turning those stats around in the last few months. Departments across the country. There is an opportunity to learn from each other. Even with a rise in unemployment and a drop in federal funding, she says the Commonwealth improved from about 49% of claimants getting paid within 35 days to about 74% by the end of 2025. Secretary Jones says a pilot program launched to reduce delays had a big impact, but admits we're still falling below the federal benchmark of 93% for timely payments. You know, we have less money to support. We have to, we kind of forced to think creatively because we have to do more with with less. As an agency, we recognized that we needed to improve our service levels and process claims more frequently and timely. So what else could possibly hold up your check? The D. U. A. Has three main checkpoints, identity verification, wage verification and investigating why claimants are unemployed. D. U. A. Director Katie Deschnitzia explained to me mistakes in any of those checkpoints can pose a problem. I would just encourage getting the most accurate information and complete responses. Um, because we will, if it comes back to us and it doesn't match, we will need to ask for a rebuttal and get more information from both parties. And that could be a delay. Boston 25 is still hearing from viewers about their current delays claimants who lost trust in the system and they're like, I give up, I can't do this. How do you want to reach that demographic of people that maybe just threw in the towel? We find this to be a top priority to improve the customer experience and we hope that individuals can recognize, yes, they may be frustrated, but we also want to make sure that we are focused on this and we are making sure that we're moving forward and advancing the work for our claimants as well. Ellie Murillo for your local station, Boston 25 News.