Listen to what I am saying here. YOU DO NOT NEED TO SUBPOENA THIS PERSON. There will be no added value to her being there. Forget this. You are not trying to beat this issue to death. Okay, just the facts, ma'am, as Joe Friday says. If you begin calling in odd people to prove this or that aspect of your testimony, latch onto little details and beat them into the ground, try to show beyond a shadow that your employer is a lousy lying no good, they're going to quickly decide you're a nut job and what you say will be much less believable. It is completely not necessary that you refute every single statement that your employer makes. You just tell your side of the story. DO NOT WORRY about what they are going to say, prepare yourself and get ready to pound every single accusation or statement they may make into the ground. Just present your facts. Be brief, professional, and exude trustworthiness. Do NOT be combative and assertive, and do not confront your employer and drag in things that are not directly related to your case.
For one thing, do not even dream they'd want to hear about your employer's son's poor attendance, except that you might mention that you have seen several other employees, in the last few months, be absent for several days in a row and no action was ever taken so you really had no reason to believe your employer would terminate you for being out of work on the days in question.
Okay, if they do not have a handbook, with your signature, saying this was company policy, and here is your signature on it and you signed off on it on such and such date, then what they'll say is that yes, it was company policy. You'll say that is was not company policy. And the hearing officer will go with the more believable.
I have even seen cases where employers manufactured handbooks and warnings, even signed by the employee, which were bogus ( I believed the claimant, and I was the hearing officer.) If something like this were to happen, you should clearly, in a dignified manner, say, "I would like to state that this is NOT my signature, and I have never received such a warning." But just because they submit something, or have a witness say something, that does not mean it will be believed unless you have a counter witness or counter proof.
But seeing everything they submitted so you can refute it line by line is not what you are supposed to be doing here. You just present your facts. You don't have to or need to pick apart everything the employer may say or submit. That just complicates and weakens the important issues. Did you quit your job? Did you know that if you were absent on these days, it would result in your termination?
The attitude you should cultivate and present here is that you do not understand how this happened, that you had NO IDEA that what took place on such and such date, when you spoke with so and so (your supervisor) as is documented in these phone records, was not being received, and understood by them as time off, not as a resignation.
You did not in any way understand that your absences on date one, date two and date three were going to lead to your being terminated. You were not told this when the conversations were held, and you were completely surprised to hear that you were being terminated. You were even more surprised to hear that they had told the unemployment office that you had quit the job. You had not done so, it was never your intention to do so, and you never made any statements to that effect.
You seem to be a very thorough and a little bit obsessive personality type. But be very sure that these unemployment hearings are not designed to go on all day. They are designed to cut quickly to the relevant part of the unemployment law, and whether or not it was applied correctly in your case. The reason you are able to self represent is that you are not going to go in there and argue brilliantly, annul and disqualify your employer's statements, and do a brilliant summation which will convince the jury. You're going to quietly and succinctly tell your story. Then a decision will be rendered.
Please, please, whatever you do, do NOT attempt to go into the hearing and quote unemployment case law to the hearing officer to argue your case. They know the laws, much better than you do, and will find this very off-putting. While they try to be objective, they are human. And if you are an ostentatious, argumentative know it all, it will be slightly harder for them to find you believable.
