Division of Family and Economic Security, Bureau of Working Families

Emergency Assistance Manual

1.3.1 Application Processing Timeframe

The W-2W-2Wisconsin Works agency must process the EAEAEmergency Assistance application within 10 working days of the application date. This includes all of the following:

  1. Determining Eligibility (see 1.3.2);  
  2. Entering all EA applications in WWPWWPWisconsin Work Programs (see 4.4.2); 
  3. Issuing an Eligibility Notice of Decision (see 1.3.4); and 
  4. Issuing Payments (see 1.3.5). 

The application date is used to determine the 10 working days timeframe. (See 1.2.2) Day one is the first working day after the application date. Day 10 ends at the close of business on the 10th working day after the application date.

EA applicants are often dealing with time-sensitive emergencies; therefore, W-2 agencies must make an eligibility decision as quickly as the situation allows. The full 10 working days must only be used in scenarios where the applicant requires additional time to obtain verification or other information necessary to process the application. EA comments in WWP must document rationale for using the full timeframe. 

EXAMPLE 1: Inez completed an EA application using Form DCF-F-DWSP2010-E and submitted to the W-2 agency office with a date stamp of Tuesday, May 29. The W-2 agency used the date of the agency date stamp (May 29) as the application date in WWP to begin the 10 working days timeframe for processing the EA application; therefore, Tuesday, June 12, is day 10.

EXAMPLE 2: Jonathan applied in ACCESS the morning of Wednesday, February 23. ACCESS processes the application with an application date of that day. Jonathan also scheduled a phone appointment in ACCESS for the following day (February 24, day 1) to continue with the application process when he can take the call in private. The EA worker has until Wednesday, March 9, to process the EA application in the 10 working days timeframe.

EXAMPLE 3: María Belén submitted an ACCESS application with an application date of Thursday, May 2. She met with her worker on Friday, May 3, and was given the list of documents required to complete her application. María Belén was able to obtain the required documents over the weekend and the worker received them Monday, May 6. The worker approved María Belén’s application that day and the EA payment was mailed the following day, Tuesday, May 7. While the agency has until Friday, May 17, per policy to process the application, they were able to process in fewer days since María Belén was able to submit her documentation quickly.