Work and Income New Zealand has started holding unemployment seminars in Queenstown.
The Work for You seminars have been held nationally for the past four years, but never in Queenstown because there had been no demand.
Since the start of the economic downturn, more people have presented themselves at the Work and Income office in Queenstown.
Regional director Sue Rissman said the Queenstown office used to give people information individually.
"We never had enough people to run a seminar before.
We might not have seen anyone for weeks because the labour market was so buoyant, but now people need more support to get back into the workforce," she said.
The seminars meant staff could give information to more people at the same time and were a more economic use of staff time.
"People are coming in to us who are newly unemployed . . . and they don't know what to do."There are eight people on the unemployment benefit in Queenstown, up from five three months ago and a year ago.
