UI Program Answer: No. There are no special rules for seasonal businesses.

UI Program Answer: It depends a great deal on your particular situation, but probably the answer is "yes."

Your UI tax rate can increase or decrease each January 1st, based on the amount of benefits paid to your former employees through the prior June 30. The rate is calculated to recover the benefit cost from you over a four-year period going forward.

One of our resort members suggested that they handle this issue by having every employee sign a form at beginning of each spring, acknowledging the limited duration of the employment because of their resort's seasonal nature.  Would this work?

UI Program Answer: Under Minnesota UI law, seasonal employees are considered laid off due to a lack of work at the end of the season when there is no more work for them. An employer is then responsible for UI benefits paid. Signing an agreement with the employer that they know the job will end on a certain date does not change this. In addition, one should be careful as an employer not to imply that applying for unemployment insurance benefits may jeopardize employment or that agreeing to not apply is a condition of employment. Such "agreements" are specifically unenforceable under UI law and therefore not binding on the employee.

1.  what type of information is the department looking for, and
2.  is there some type of strategy used in reporting the information, especially if the employer doesn't feel the unemployment is justified?

UI Program Answer: When someone applies for UI benefits, you always get a notice or determination with instructions about what common issues are raised and how to raise one. If the employee is laid off and you know he or she is looking for full-time work, there is probably no issue to raise and you do not have to respond.

The best way to raise an issue is in your online UI account. Click on 'Determinations' and 'Issue Summary', then input the social security number of the applicant.  Follow the links for raising an issue. You choose from a menu of possible issues, such as "quit", "refused offer of work", "not available for work", and so on. Once you choose the issue you want to raise, a questionnaire appears with specific questions you need to answer about the issue.

So there is no strategy or secret to contesting UI benefits, other than to give complete and detailed responses to the questions. All of your responses are reviewed by real human beings who do this for a living.

You may assume that they will read your submission carefully, but you should not necessarily assume they understand your business or why certain rules are important to you and how they affect your business – we deal with 120,000 employers and they are all a little different. Don’t use shorthand or inside jargon. Don’t assume that we know how your particular business works.

My resort keeps getting telemarketing calls and 'junk'(?) mail stating that we are not in compliance with MN State Employment laws if we don't pay this supposed company for posters/flyers regarding continually new MN state employee laws.　 Is this a scam or are they correct?

UI Program Answer:  UI law requires employers to post an "UNEMPLOYED?" poster within their workplace so that employees may readily see it. Posters can be downloaded at www.uimn.org > Employer Information > Workplace Posters. Or you can call 651-296-6141 to receive free posters. There is no reason to pay anyone to get these posters.

Just to clarify, we only need to post the 1 "unemployed?" poster somewhere near where the bulk of our employees collect their tools/supplies.  (Does it have to be eye-level?  Any other hanging requirements?)  No other posters required (although if there's space, we can post any other MN employment posters we want, right?)

UI Program Answer:   There is no particular requirement for the posters other than that they are displayed prominently. In larger organizations they are typically posted in break rooms. If you don’t have that kind of structure, then posting them in an area frequented by employees makes sense. There’s no particular height requirement, but “eye level” makes sense. There are actually a number of posters required for all employers – wage and hour, workers comp. The Department of Labor and Industry maintains a site where you can download the required posters. http://www.dli.mn.gov/LS/Posters.asp

CMR:  there has been lots of chat on our group e-mail about the New Hire Law.  Do they need to call every spring with new employees, even if they hired them the previous year?   When calling, what info do they need to have available during the recorded message?

UI Program Answer: We do not administer the “new hire” law. This is done through the Department of Human Services. I just looked quickly and found this page on the DHS website. http://newhire-reporting.com/MN-Newhire/default.aspx