California’s Unemployment Agency Wastes Millions on Unused Phones

A recent report has revealed that the California Employment Development Department (EDD) has wasted a significant amount of money—over $4.6 million—on unused cell phone plans. This situation has been highlighted by the California State Auditor.

Specifically, the agency spent this money on more than 6,200 mobile devices intended for the unemployment insurance department. These devices, originally acquired to help staff manage a surge in unemployment claims during the COVID-19 pandemic, ended up largely unused.

To accommodate remote work, EDD purchased 7,224 devices, including smartphones and wireless hotspots. However, the audit uncovered that as of April 2025—well after most pandemic restrictions were lifted—the agency was still incurring monthly fees for many of these devices.

Many of these phones were found gathering dust in a storage room at the unemployment office. Alarmingly, 6,285 devices had not been used for at least four months, and over 5,000 had remained untouched for more than a year. Some languished there for more than four years.

It’s worth noting that the investigation might have missed a larger picture, as it examined only one of the agency’s multiple accounts with Verizon and T-Mobile.

This mobile phone mismanagement adds to the EDD’s track record of issues, including widespread fraud. Just a couple of years ago, the agency admitted to potentially losing up to $31 billion due to fraudulent claims, with some complaints even being filed in the names of prison inmates using absurd aliases.

By June 2022, it was reported that authorities had managed to recover about $1 billion in these stolen funds.

In response, an EDD spokesperson stated, “After management was alerted to this issue, we took immediate action. We have adopted all of our auditors’ recommendations, immediately implemented our call-blocking efforts, and formalized our policy for future automatic call-disconnect controls.”