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 (UI) 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 – Continued progress was made towards completing the integration of the Benefit Charging System (BCS) into the existing benefits system (IBIS); however much of the team’s resources remained dedicated to ongoing unprecedented workload and projects related to the COVID-19 crisis and 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 continues efforts to integrate and update the existing fraud detection, prevention and collections system. The team has completed integration of the main functionalities and will continue development work to complete integration as well as implement upgrades to currently deployed functionalities. Presently, crossmatches are being completed in IBIS.

• SIDES – the Earnings Verification module has been fully implemented.  The Department will conduct an Employer Outreach campaign in calendar year 2023 in order to encourage employer use of SIDES and this module.

• GenTax was successfully upgraded in September 2021 and is operating as intended. Users are pleased with the enhanced functionality.

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.