PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — In the hours following Governor Kate Brown’s announcement of a statewide “freeze” due to rising cases of the coronavirus, the Oregon Employment Department said it was preparing for an increase in unemployment claims.

The department wanted to alert workers who will lose their jobs due to the restrictions, and let them know that they will need to file an initial claim or restart a stopped claim. For those who have returned to work after getting laid off at the beginning of the pandemic, they will need to restart their claim.

“While the Two-Week Freeze may not directly affect all businesses, we want Oregonians to know that we are in a much better place than we were at the start of the pandemic to respond to an uptick in unemployment claims,” said acting director David Gerstenfeld in a statement.

The department is getting ready to increase its claims processing capacity with the help of the National Guard. There is also an Eligibility Quiz that Oregonians who are impacted by the two-week freeze can take to see which benefit program they are eligible for.

As part of its preparation, the OED is developing a way for employers to submit employee information in bulk “to minimize the need for employees to locate key information that may not be easily accessible.”