Washington Revised Code Title 50. Unemployment Compensation § 50.12.365. Plain language required for letters, alerts, and notices

(1) The department must designate department employees to assure that letters, alerts, and notices produced manually or by the department's unemployment insurance technology system are written in plainly understood language and tested on claimants before they are approved for use.  Criteria for approval must include comprehensibility, clarity, and readability.  If the messaging of any letter, alert, or notice falls short of those criteria, manual methods of producing a comprehensible version shall be considered while the department waits for their unemployment insurance technology system to incorporate required modifications.

(2) Determinations and redeterminations must clearly convey applicable statute numbers, a brief explanation of pertinent law, outline of relevant facts, reasoning, decision, and result.

(3) The department will work with an unemployment insurance advisory committee comprised of business and worker advocates to explore:

(4) Dedicated toll-free phone lines must be established for claimants who lack computer skills or access to computers, claimants with disabilities, and claimants with limited English proficiency.