Unemployment insurance.

California's Senate Labor Committee, led by Chair Smallwood-Cuevas alongside Senators Cortese, Durazo, and Laird, proposes updating the state's Unemployment Insurance Code to formally recognize electronic communications alongside traditional mail delivery methods.

The legislation establishes that terms like "mail," "mailed," and "mailing" encompass both physical delivery through the U.S. Postal Service or other carriers and electronic transmission methods. For electronic communications, the bill defines the "postmark date" as the date when the document was sent. These definitions apply throughout the Unemployment Insurance Code unless specifically noted otherwise.

This definitional update aligns the code's communication requirements with current practices while maintaining existing unemployment insurance processes and procedures. The change affects how unemployment insurance applicants, recipients, and administrators document and track time-sensitive communications within the system.