The Texas Workforce Commission has announced expanded hours for recently unemployed Texans to reach them.  The new hours are 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. 7 days a week (closed Easter Sunday).  Hopefully this will help deal with the 700,000-plus claims filed within the past three weeks.

The Texas Workforce Commission has added hundreds of staff and has outsourced to third-party call centers but is still not able to keep up with the million-plus calls per day in the wake of record unemployment due to Covid-19.  Applicants are being asked to stagger both their website application visits and their telephone calls to the agency, based on each applicant's area code.  If everyone will follow this schedule, it should allow more people to quickly submit their unemployment claims:  

Recommended Call and Access Times
Area Codes Beginning with 9: Mon-Wed-Fri 8:00 a.m. - Noon
Area Codes Beginning with 3, 4, 5, 6: Mon-Wed-Fri 1:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Area codes Beginning with 7, 8: Tues-Thurs-Sat  8:00 a.m. - Noon 
Area codes Beginning with 2: Tues-Thurs-Sat 1:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.