Public Accountability Report

The Illinois Department of Employment Security's (IDES) mission is to connect our talented workforce to the education, training, and jobs necessary to keep Illinois’ economy strong; produce, analyze, and disseminate labor market information; and ensure that eligible individuals receive the unemployment insurance benefits to which they are entitled. IDES is committed to the integrity of the UI program and will continue to advance internal strategies and leverage national partnerships to strengthen the program.

The Department will continue to provide timely and quality service to job seekers, claimants, and employers. Due to the pandemic, the agency has seen an unprecedented number of unemployment claims and attempted fraudulent claims. IDES has upgraded hardware and software systems to meet this demand and will continue to examine and enhance claims processing systems.

• Correspondence Revamp – The agency’s continued response to the COVID-19 pandemic presents on opportunity to improve agency correspondence. The Department is renewing its focus on plain language and accessibility to ensure that both new and existing correspondence is easily understandable. Correspondence for both claimants and employers will undergo continuous updates to ensure clear communication that is consistent with state and federal best practices.
• Benefit Charging System – Significant progress was made towards completing the integration of the Benefit Charging System (BCS) into the existing benefits system (IBIS), but the COVID-19 crisis required the team to refocus all efforts to address the unprecedented workload created due to the pandemic.  As previously stated, integrating the BCS functionality on IBIS will allow the benefit system to be better positioned to communicate with GenTax and better manage UI tax functions and the goal is to complete the migration into IBIS by the end of Calendar Year 2022.
• Benefit Payment Control Systems Update – With OATS (Overpayment Audit and Tracking System) the agency will complete efforts to integrate and update the existing fraud detection, prevention and collections system. This project was near completion prior to the COVID-19 crisis which required all staff to focus on responding to the unprecedented workload and is now expected to be completed by September 2022.

GenTax was upgraded to Version 12 in September 2021.  The upgrade provided users with a more responsive interface and a variety of other enhancements such as:

• Multi Factor authentication data security and improved secure file processing;
• A new home page, along with automatic view sizing for mobile devices; and
• Usability improvements for e-Services, including notification preferences such as mail delivery.

The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act requires Illinois to have a unified strategic planning process across core workforce programs, to encourage a broader planning scope, and to better align and leverage various agencies’ federal funding streams. It applies a single set of outcome metrics to every federal workforce program under the Act, including Title III/Wagner-Peyser services administered by IDES.  The Department plays a key role in reporting to the U.S. Department of Labor on progress under the plan, as well as developing updated strategies over the course of the plan. The Department continues to be the go-to resource for wage, employer, and workforce participation information for all workforce partners in Illinois.

The Department’s Economic Information and Analysis (EI&A) Division is the premier source for statewide and local information on labor markets and workforce outcomes. EI&A also manages the Illinois Career Information System, which provides the most current and reliable career information for everyone from students to adult job-seekers and second-career seniors. Information will be based on customer-driven geographies and made available in a timely manner. The Department is currently reviewing its publications and news releases of these data sets to better inform consumers of the data’s benefits and applications. IDES will expand its automated integrity system to further reduce waste, fraud, and UI abuse. This effort will include a monthly wage records cross-match to ensure that those who have returned to work do not continue to receive benefits; UI overpayments; and recover overpayments into the agency’s modern UI benefits system.