The first was a Statement of Wages and Potential Benefit Amounts informing me that I did earn enough in my base period to receive unemployment benefits. The weekly benefit amount is $465 and I have 52 weeks to claim unemployment, or until I reach the maximum during my benefit year, $12090, which would be 26 weeks of payments.
There is a delay from when you apply for benefits to when you can request payments. My first eligible week will be the week ending 17 January. I can't request payment until 21 January. I'm really glad I'm not depending on this payment since I have savings. I'll be writing quite a bit about budgeting to live within the benefit amount.
Included was a copy of the Unemployment Benefits Handbook.
The second letter reiterated the minimum of five weekly contacts (I guess this is the same as "work search activities" ?) beginning on my effective date of 11 January. It took some digging, but I finally found a list of acceptable work search activities in addition to what's printed on the back of the letter.
You must keep a work search log! Included in my paperwork was a paper copy of a search log. You can make copies, or print search logs from the website. I'm keeping a spreadsheet of my activities instead. The TWC can request this log at any time, so keep it up-to-date.
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