How to log and report your Utah unemployment work search
By Ben Glasser · Nov 5, 2026 · 9 min read
Each week you claim Utah unemployment, you answer for that week only, and one of those answers is the employers you contacted. The Department of Workforce Services claimant guide says you must keep a detailed record and provide it when you file. A contact outside the week does not count. Opening a page without submitting an application does not count either. If you cannot produce the list, the guide says benefits can be denied or delayed, and an overpayment and penalties are possible.
This page follows the Utah UI Claimant Guide and the tips and sample record in the Claimant Guide PDF. It is not a substitute for the guide, and it is not legal advice. The guide says you are accountable for what is in it. If a Workforce Services representative gives you a different plan, follow that instruction.
The week you are filing for
An unemployment week starts Sunday at 12 a.m. and ends Saturday at 11:59 p.m. You file one weekly claim for that week. The questions apply only to it.
File online at jobs.utah.gov: Sign in, then my Unemployment, then File Weekly Claim. Claims are not taken over the phone. You need the Social Security number on the claim and the four-digit PIN you chose when you opened it. That PIN is your signature. Only you are authorized to file. You cannot hand that duty to someone else, including a spouse.
File on Sunday, or as soon as you can after the Saturday the week ends. The system does not take a late filing, and filing late can mean a denial. If you do not file within 27 days of the Saturday of the last week you filed, the claim is closed. Reopening it at jobs.utah.gov makes the claim effective the Sunday of the week you reopen, and you may not be allowed to file the weeks you skipped.
File while you are waiting on a decision, and keep filing during an appeal if you are still unemployed or earning less than your weekly payment. You may not be paid for weeks you skip, including weeks an appeal later decides in your favor. The first eligible week is an unpaid waiting week. You still file it and still meet the work-search rules, or you do not get waiting-week credit.
Four new full-time contacts
Unless a Workforce Services representative instructs you otherwise, you must make a good faith effort to seek full-time work each week you claim benefits. That still applies in a week when you are working part-time or attending school. The guide says the effort has to reflect a genuine desire to find a job immediately.
The work-search section says you should make at least four new full-time job contacts each week. The question on the weekly claim is firmer. It says: "You are required to make four new full-time employer contacts each week. You will be required to provide this employer information." The tips at the back of the pamphlet say those four contacts have to fall between Sunday at 12 a.m. and Saturday at 11:59 p.m. to count toward eligibility.
Two rules in those tips decide whether a line on your log counts:
- Looking at an employer's website is not a contact. You need to submit a resume or an application through the site.
- Different positions at the same company can count as separate contacts if you document each job. The pamphlet's example is one employer, an office-assistant opening and a receptionist opening, each with its own job number.
If the claim is selected for review, the tips say Workforce Services may contact the employers you listed and ask them to confirm you applied.
What to write down for each contact
Provide that record during the weekly filing. An audit or an eligibility review can ask for it again. Each employer contact should include:
- Date of contact
- Company name, or another identifier such as a job reference number
- Company address, phone number, email, web link, or the person you contacted
- Position title
- Method of contact
- Result of the contact
The sample Job Search Record at the back of the pamphlet uses those columns: date, company name, company contact information, position title, method of contact, and results. It asks for the job ID with the title when the posting has one, and for as much contact detail as you have. Result examples printed on that table are waiting, not hiring, and hired.
When you apply on a website, the tips say to record the site address, the company offering the job if it differs from the site, the title, and the job ID. The pamphlet's example is the site, the company name if it is different, the role (its sample says "customer service rep"), and a job number. Keep every confirmation email from an employer while you are filing.
A record you can keep yourself
The guide requires the record. It does not require a particular notebook, spreadsheet, or app. The sample table at the back of the pamphlet is enough.
Write the row the day you submit the application. A contact dated outside that Sunday-through-Saturday window does not count toward that week's four. Rebuilding the list on Sunday morning is how a date lands in the wrong week.
A row that follows the pamphlet's own example looks like this. For the week of Sunday, November 1, 2026 through Saturday, November 7, the date is Monday, November 2. The company is XYZ Company. The contact detail is the site address, plus the employer name if the site is a job board. The position is office assistant, job number 789. A receptionist opening at the same company, job number 9876, is a second row. The method is the resume or application you submitted. The result is waiting, until it changes to something else the sample lists, such as not hiring or hired. Change the result when you hear back, and leave the date as the day you applied.
Before you file, read only the rows dated that Sunday through Saturday. Set aside a page you opened and did not apply on. Keep the confirmation email with the row.
Registration, workshops, and reviews
The four contacts are not the only condition in the guide.
Unless you are told otherwise, register for work at jobs.utah.gov under my Unemployment, Register for Work, or at the nearest employment center. Update that registration when you open or reopen a claim. Missing it within 10 working days of your application can mean a denial. If you live outside Utah, or you move, register with the employment service where you live and send Workforce Services proof.
To stay eligible, the guide also requires online workshops, an in-person Re-Employment Services and Eligibility Assessment (RESEA) appointment, an in-person workshop, or other reemployment activities. Skipping one you were told to attend can mean a denial. The guide does not say a workshop stands in for one of the four employer contacts. Employment centers help with the job search. They do not have unemployment insurance information and cannot help with the claim. For the claim, use Live Chat in my Unemployment or the CARE Team.
An eligibility-review notice asks basic eligibility questions and requires your work-search contacts. Benefits may be denied if you skip the review, fail to submit the contact list, list contacts that cannot be verified, or fail to schedule and attend an RESEA appointment after you were notified. Claims are also selected at random for audit. Auditors check work search along with wages, separation, school attendance, and earnings. Failing to participate as required may result in a denial.
The other answers on that same claim
The contact question sits next to questions about work and about turning a job down. Report gross earnings, before taxes or deductions, for the week you worked, even if you have not been paid. That includes part-time, temporary, and full-time work, paid training, and self-employment or commission work. Self-employment or commission sales can affect eligibility even when no wages were received.
Workforce Services applies a 30 percent earnings allowance. In the guide's example, a $300 weekly benefit means you could earn $90 that week without reducing the payment. You still report the $90. If earnings equal or exceed the weekly benefit, or you work 40 or more hours, you do not receive a payment or waiting-week credit for that week.
Report any failure to seek or accept work in the week it happened, even if you thought the job was not suitable. Suitability depends on how long you have been unemployed. You may look for work like your base-period work while that is a reasonable expectation, and later you are expected to concede on pay, hours, conditions, duties, and prior training. The guide's exceptions, which you still report, are a strike, lockout, or other labor dispute; wages, hours, or conditions much less favorable than similar local work; and a job that requires you to join a labor organization, resign from one, or stay out of one. Workforce Services decides suitability.
After you answer, the guide says your responses are shown back to you so you can correct them or certify them. If you find a mistake after you certified, sign in to my Unemployment and use Live Chat, or contact the CARE Team. Do that then, rather than hoping a later week will correct it.
Before you certify
Read the four lines the way an employer would hear them if Workforce Services called. Each contact is inside Sunday at 12 a.m. through Saturday at 11:59 p.m. Each one is an application or a resume you submitted, not a page you only opened. Each line has a date, a company, a way to reach that employer, a title, a method, and a result, and the confirmation email is still saved.
A notebook or a spreadsheet with the six columns from the sample record is enough. Jobloggr is one other way to keep that list. On a Pro plan it can export a week as a CSV or PDF with date, employer, position, a URL or email, method, and result, and you can edit a cell before you download. How that export works. You still sign in at jobs.utah.gov and certify the week yourself.
Utah's instructions can change, and a representative can direct a different work search. Read the current Claimant Guide before you rely on this page.