r/UnemploymentWA • u/Choo-johnson • Nov 12 '25

Waiting on OP to Respond to finish initial Troubleshooting In adjudication for self employment - Troubleshooting help

  • Date you applied: Sept 7
  • name of open eligibility issues: Self-Employment
  • type of job separation: Laid off

Troubleshooting help please

My questions are – do I need to be doing anything more than filing weekly claims? Is there a way to get the process moving faster? Is it just a waiting game at this point?

Background: I started filing but selected "self-employement" as a form of work because I was hoping to pick up some contract work (marketing) while I sort out what's next for me. I got moved into adjudication on Oct 10. I have worked minimal self-employment hours, and and have not been paid for any contract work yet.

Thanks so much

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u/SoThenIThought_ Admin for WEBA.Law, WA Unemployment Benefits Nov 12 '25

Hi There

Situation:

You've been working in self employment and haven't worked "much" and have not been paid.

You recently received and responded to a fact-finding questionnaire titled "Self-Employment"

After responding, all claims are marked Pending.

You do not know why this happened

You do not know what part of the questionnaire is relevant

If an answer you gave would disqualify you'v want to know before starting an escalation which would kill the claim if the answer isn't corrected

If correct you want to usher a decision

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u/SoThenIThought_ Admin for WEBA.Law, WA Unemployment Benefits Nov 12 '25 edited Nov 26 '25

Self- Employment

Apart from the distinction between casual labor and self-employment (SEE GUIDES BELOW), once the claimant is sure its self-employment, proceed below

Self-Employment isn't bad; ESD wants you to work, that's why they have the Self-Employment Assistance program (SEAP)

  • To be eligible for unemployment, you have to be ready, willing and looking for full time suitable work that you can start immediately. Sometime working in self-employment can reduce your availability for a regular full-time W-2 job.

  • For all types of work you do during an unemployment claim: The hours worked and income earned must be reported in the week in which the work was done REGARDLESS if you've been paid or note (Yep, Handbook and website's exact wording)

    • [Self employment is reported at net income, see compiled info below]

When a claimant reports self-employment for the 3rd time in a benefit year, this automatically triggers sending the claimant a fact-finding questionnaire called SELF EMPLOYMENT.

You've already responded, and we can view your response in your online account.

There's actually only one part of the self-employment fact finding that has any power over the claim, which is 4 questions.

What we really need to do is have you go physically look. it's in your online account.

You can review your submission by doing this Yes this is a guide for looking at job separation stuff but it's still the same process

They don't send you a second fact finding. The nature of the work has no bearing on the claim (apart from determining that its not causal labor). Whether or not you've been paid or not has no bearing on the claim

If the questions are answered incorrectly or against eligibility then we can change them (generally: If its been less that 30 days since the response to the SELF EMPLOYMENT fact-finding was submitted). We cannot change them once we ask this to be expedited because... that just doesn't make any sense - they're not going to change things once you yell at them to process everything. We must do this now.

(IMAGE OF RELEVANT QUESTIONS){https://imgur.com/a/AOPN30P)

Questions 4, 9 and 10

what are the answers you have for those?

There is also a section when you have to fill in average hours worked over a week. This often necessitates a brief talk about pro-rating average weekly hours worked. e.g. Person works 8 hrs/ mo at farmers market, therefore avg hours worked/ wk = 2, NOT 8 [8 x 4 = 32hrs monthly] accompanied by a brief description of pro-ration math

Info on how to Appeal a Disqualification for ABLE and AVAILABLE - Self-Employment

----- Relevant Compilation Info -----

Self employed Work/Multiple Employers/Paid Late

Added 2/22/2023 Reporting Self-employed Income, FAQ

Vacation/PTO/Retirement Pay

Laws including Severance

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u/SoThenIThought_ Admin for WEBA.Law, WA Unemployment Benefits Nov 12 '25

u/Choo-johnson

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u/SoThenIThought_ Admin for WEBA.Law, WA Unemployment Benefits Nov 12 '25

u/Choo-johnson i know its a lot of info but that way you get it upfront so there no chance your left getting ghosted by me. Thanks for making a post on this! this is popular conversation topic.

I'll be in an out of Reddit periodically today

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u/Choo-johnson Nov 12 '25

u/SoThenIThought_

Thanks! This is super helpful. After reading this, I'm sure I have not received the questionnaire even though I've submitted 6 claims where I answered "Yes" to:
"Did you work in self-employment or casual labor, whether you have been paid yet or not?"

I also noticed, when reviewing my "initial claimant filing" and first "Self-Employment" filing , I answered "No" to "We received information that you may be self-employed. Are you or have you been self-employed since you applied for unemployment benefits?"

I think the correct answer is "Yes" because I only started self-employment/contract work after I was laid off.

Do I need to revise this? Is there a way to revise this?

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u/SoThenIThought_ Admin for WEBA.Law, WA Unemployment Benefits Nov 13 '25

So are you saying that you've been working in self-employment but you have just been reporting that you haven't been working in self-employment simply because you haven't been paid yet?

Okay then self-employment isn't what's holding up the claim then

You just thought it was because You believed that that was somehow part of your initial eligibility determination but it turns out that it's unlikely that your job separation has even been adjudicated and you may not have been aware until right now that multiple eligibility issues need to be decided for you to be found eligible. It's not just a giant rubber stamp yes or no. Which is why we've been discussing like such a specific single issue within a category. The issue of self-employment within the category of able and available

We just need to do the regular troubleshooting then

Let me know when you're ready because we need to find out what is the name of the eligibility issue that's holding the claim up and there's a very specific place and we need to look in that specific place and I will tell you that specific place

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u/Choo-johnson Nov 13 '25

u/SoThenIThought_ Nope, sorry. I have been reporting as working in self employment but only 3-7 hrs per week and 0 income. The Issue on the claim is marked as "self-employment"

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u/Choo-johnson Nov 13 '25

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u/SoThenIThought_ Admin for WEBA.Law, WA Unemployment Benefits Nov 13 '25

Okay cool let's just make sure that this is the correct title of the open eligibility issue. This looks like a screenshot from the pending issues tab. I generally don't ask for this. The guide that I'm going to give you that I give to everyone else doesn't ask for this. We need to look at a different place just to make sure. It's going to take about 30 seconds once you log in. You need to do step two

I WANT CUSTOM HELP, I WANT THE MOD TO WALK ME THROUGH IT SO I DON'T MAKE A MISTAKE

Pending? Info I need to help you; Initial eligibility Troubleshooting

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u/Choo-johnson Nov 13 '25

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u/SoThenIThought_ Admin for WEBA.Law, WA Unemployment Benefits Nov 13 '25

Can you please show me a screenshot of the online activity tab in desktop mode like this, such that the lowest item on the screen should be initial claim filing

(Full disclosure I was going from 8:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. today on administration and Reddit and I'm about to pass out for the night so I might not be back until tomorrow)

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u/Choo-johnson Nov 13 '25

No worries– I'm encouraged just to feel like I'm making any sort of progress here. Thanks for your help. Screenshot below.

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u/SoThenIThought_ Admin for WEBA.Law, WA Unemployment Benefits Nov 16 '25

ok got it I just re-read everything.

let me know when you are here please

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