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Florida’s unemployment website Connect will be down Friday

DEO says website will be available again March 29

Recommendations to fix DEO Connect System

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Florida’s unemployment website Connect will be unavailable Friday to process claims, according to the state Department of Economic Opportunity.

The DEO announced Thursday afternoon the reemployment assistance customer service center and the Connect portal would be down for all of Friday, March 26. The website will be down as the DEO works to process pandemic unemployment assistance benefits made available through the most recent federal coronavirus relief bill. The PUA program was extended to Sept. 6 under the third coronavirus relief bill known as the American Rescue Plan Act.

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All services are expected to be back up and running March 29 at 8 a.m.

Thursday’s report from the Labor Department showed that jobless claims fell from 781,000 the week before. It is the first time that weekly applications for jobless aid have fallen below 700,000 since mid-March of last year. Before the pandemic tore through the economy, applications had never topped that level.

Since last March, the Florida DEO has processed more than 5 million claims seeking unemployment benefits and paid out more than $24 billion to claimants, much of that from federal funding.