Four new units of the Department of Social and Family Affairs will be set up to process the dramatic surge in unemployment claims.
Minister for Social and Family Affairs Mary Hanafin said that in the last three months of 2008, staff had processed some 155,000 claims – an increase of 74 per cent on the same period the previous year.
Figures published this week showed the number of people signing on for jobseekers' payments hit a record high of 327,860 in January, bringing unemployment to a 13-year high of 9.2 per cent.
Some 36,498 people signed on for the first time last month, as companies shed staff after Christmas, according to Live Register data released by the Central Statistics Office (CSO).
Ms Hanafin said her department’s staff was “very conscious of the pressures that members of the public are under when coming into the offices to claim jobseekers’ payments”.
To help speed up processing claims, four central decisions units will be set up in Dublin city centre, Sligo, Finglas and Carrick-on-Shannon, each of which will have 10 staff processing and deciding on claims, Ms Hanafin said.
They will be able to process claims from offices in various regions which are experiencing an increased claimload and backlogs in processing.
“We are looking at implementing a range of initiatives and are continually reviewing our claims processing system to help us deal with the unprecedented increase in claims for jobseekers’ payments,” the Minister said.
The department also said today it had made its application forms for jobless people available online for the first time.
Ms Hanafin said the online development was part of a series of service “improvement measures” being brought in to help speed up the process for those who have lost their jobs or who have been put on reduced working hours.
She said there was also a great deal of information on the site which meant people could take time to read the forms and understand what is required before making their claim.
“Being able to have the forms filled out in advance of arriving in the social welfare office and having the appropriate documents, such as P45 and photographic ID such as driver’s licence or passport, will help both the jobseeker and the offices processing claims,” she said.
Forms for jobseeker's allowance and jobseeker's benefit are available for download from the 'recently unemployed' section on the welfare.ie website.