CONDUCTING A HEARING

CONDUCTING A HEARING

I.              BEFORE STARTING THE ACTUAL HEARING

a. PREPARATION: Review the Determination, Hearing Notice (look for LATE APPEALS, and remember that your authority to adjudicate the case extends no further than the ISSUE on the Notice), the fact-finding docs *AND* any exhibits already uploaded by the parties.

b. I always have the Determination and Hearing Notice open in separate tabs

II.            DIALING IN

a.    ALWAYS RECORD YOURSELF DIALING IN, state the phone number (dial 301-298-1561 BUT SAY “800-201-3962”) and your 6-digit code on the record (BUT *NOT* THE LEADER CODE), and record even the periods of silence if nobody is present.   (DO NOT STOP THE RECORDING EVER.)

b. PRO TIP: Get in the habit of looking at the hearing notice when dialing in, because sometimes you may be assigned to hear cases that were originally docketed to somebody else.

III.           STARTING THE HEARING

a. Administrative hearing, being recorded, and note that you are going to do a brief electronic roll call that you will hear but the parties won’t (*8).

b. CONFIRM APPEARANCES BASED ON ROLL CALL:

c. When everybody is present or at the end of the 10-minute grace period (whichever comes first), say and do another electronic roll call (*8)

IV.          OPENING THE HEARING

a.    PROCEDURE

b.    SUGGESTED LANGUAGE FOR SWEARING IN THE PARTIES: “Do you declare or affirm under the penalty of perjury that the testimony you are about to give shall be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?”

                                          i. If an interpreter is present, you must give him/her a separate oath: “Do you declare or affirm under the penalty of perjury that you are fully fluent in English and [INDENTIFY LANGUAGE] and that you will truthfully and accurate translate, WITHOUT DEVIATION, all questions asked and all answers given?”

                                         ii. In those rare cases where you have a deaf party who participates through their own special relay service, the relay operator typically refuses to take the oath..  You can ask them to do so, but if they refuse, simply go forward with the hearing anyway.

c.     SUGGESTED LANGUAGE FOR DESIGNATING THE AGENCY RECORD: “Before starting the hearing, I need to identify the agency record.  The agency record in this case consists of the appeal letter submitted by the appellant and the agency fact-finding report.  The fact-finding report is a summary of the fact-finding interview conducted by the Division of Unemployment Insurance in order to determine the claimant’s eligibility for benefits.  The information in the fact-finding documents was used to generate the benefit determination which is currently on appeal.”

V.            TESTIMONY

VI.          CLOSING

VII.         CONCLUSION

VIII.        EVIDENTIARY STUFF

a.    Admitting documentary evidence (EXHIBIT PAGES)

b.    Handling objections