Unemployment if you quit or were fired in North Dakota

Quit, fired or refused work

If you quit

If you quit without good cause attributable to your employer, you are disqualified. Quitting because you expected to be fired or laid off counts as quitting without good cause. Job Service considers risk to your health, safety and morals, your fitness, training, experience and earnings, and the distance to work.

Examples the state names:

• Leaving because of illness or injury on a doctor's written order, after telling the employer and offering to return when able (within 60 days of your last day)
• Leaving because of an illness or injury caused or made worse by the job, on a doctor's written order, with no reasonable alternative
• Leaving work 200 or more road miles from home to take a bona fide job less than 200 road miles from home
• Leaving to take a bona fide job offer from a base-period employer who laid you off and with whom you have a demonstrated job attachment
• Leaving because of domestic violence, stalking or sexual assault, with documents sent to Job Service within 14 days of filing
• Leaving to relocate with your military spouse under permanent change of station orders, after trying to keep the job
• Leaving, within 10 weeks, a job you could have refused with good cause

If you were fired

You are disqualified if you were discharged for misconduct in connection with your most recent work. Job Service's examples include violating a posted or known company rule, insubordination, theft, destroying company property, and unexcused absences. A discharge for gross misconduct disqualifies you for one year.

If benefits are denied for the separation

After quitting without good cause, you must earn at least 8 times your weekly benefit amount in later work. After a discharge for misconduct, or refusing suitable work, you must earn at least 10 times your weekly benefit amount. In each case you must not have left that later job under disqualifying circumstances.

Refusing work

If you fail without good cause to accept or apply for suitable work, or to return to your usual self-employment when directed, you are disqualified until you earn 10 times your weekly benefit amount in later work. After 18 straight weeks of benefits, any work paying the maximum weekly benefit amount is considered suitable (with health, safety and distance still considered).

Law: N.D.C.C. secs. 52-06-02, 52-06-36

Official source: Source page

You usually must be unemployed through no fault of your own. In most states this means you lost your job because there was not enough work.

Able, available and looking for work

If you are not going back to the employer who laid you off (and are not a paid-up union member on the out-of-work list), you must make your assigned number of job contacts every week you claim, including your waiting week, starting the week you apply. A job contact means applying for a specific job you are qualified for and would accept, for at least the hours you worked in your base period. Following up on an application or attending an interview does not count as a new contact.

Records to keep

Record each contact on the Job Contacts form (date, company, address or website, phone, job title or job order number, and for phone or in-person contacts the person with hiring authority). Save application confirmations or screenshots. Job Service verifies contacts.

Law: N.D.C.C. sec. 52-06-01

Official source: Source page

To be paid for a week, you must be able to work, available to work and actively seeking work.

Law: 42 U.S.C. 503(a)(12)

Noncitizens

What the state says

If you are not a U.S. citizen, have your alien identification number ready when you file. You cannot receive benefits unless you are a U.S. citizen or legally authorized to work in the U.S.

Free help

Call 701-328-4995. Legal aid and other free help in North Dakota → Official sources →