You log in expecting to see your claim and payments, and instead the claim is missing, the status hasn’t changed in weeks, or a payment you know about isn’t listed. Before assuming the worst, check which portal you are using. Since 20 May 2026 uFiling no longer handles employee benefit claims at all, so a uFiling login that shows nothing is normal. Worker claims now live on UIF Online.
Work through the problems below in order. Most have a cause you can fix yourself; the rest need the UIF to look at your file.
Problem: no claim appears in your profile
- You lodged the claim on uFiling. Claims submitted there were stored separately and are being migrated to UIF Online. The Department’s position is that none went missing, but a migrated claim may take time to appear. Keep your uFiling confirmation SMS or reference.
- You applied at a labour centre. A paper application may not be linked to an online profile you created later. Ask the labour centre that took it for the claim reference.
- You are in a different profile. If you registered more than once, or someone else registered for you, the claim may sit under the other account. Don’t register again to “fix” it; ask the call centre which profile holds the claim.
- The application never completed. If you never received a confirmation, the submission may not have gone through.
Problem: the status is stuck
The UIF’s published service standard is 20 working days to approve a complete claim, with the money due within a further 7 to 10 working days once assessed. Those are targets, not guarantees, and the clock effectively stops while anything is missing. A claim that stalls has usually hit one of these:
- an outstanding document, most often the employer’s UI-19 declaration or salary schedule;
- bank details that couldn’t be verified;
- for unemployment claims, a continuation (the four-weekly confirmation, form UI-6A) that wasn’t submitted, so no new payment can be approved.
The wording of a status tells you which stage you’re stuck at; our list of UIF claim statuses and their meanings explains each one. A “rejected” claim usually means documents are missing, the application is incomplete or credits are short, and it can be fixed and resubmitted. A “refused” claim is a decision that can be appealed.
Problem: a payment is missing from the history
First match your continuation dates against the payments listed. If a period you confirmed has no payment beside it, or a payment is listed but the bank never received it, the UIF’s own advice is to phone its call centre, or take a bank statement for that period to a labour centre. Bring the statement on paper or ready to show on your phone.
Yours to fix, or the UIF’s?
You can sort out a wrong portal, a missed continuation, a missing document you hold yourself, or a request to your employer for a UI-19. Things you can’t fix from your side include a claim lost in migration, a duplicate profile, wrong employer declarations, or bank details the UIF captured incorrectly. Login and password trouble is a separate issue, covered in our UIF online login help. For a tour of a profile that’s working normally, see the UIF Online dashboard guide.
Logging a query that gets answered
Use the enquiry option inside UIF Online first, since it ties the question to your claim. If that doesn’t work, try the toll-free number, 0800 030 007, or write to uifcallcenter@labour.gov.za. Whatever channel you use, state your ID number, the claim or reference number, the benefit type, the date you applied and exactly what you see, for example “claim not listed since migration” or “payment for March confirmed but not received”. Write down the reference number you are given. If weeks pass with no answer, escalate to uifcomplaints@labour.gov.za and quote that reference. The full list of official addresses is in our UIF contact directory.