CRANSTON — Although Rhode Island’s unemployment rate keeps rising, the long waits are just about over for those trying to reach the state Department of Labor and Training’s unemployment insurance call center.

The agency is answering phones and e-mails more quickly, and processing claims for benefits more promptly, said Raymond A. Filippone, the agency’s assistant director who oversees the state’s unemployment programs.

The system will be tested anew over the next few weeks, as claims for benefits spike for seasonal and other reasons.

To date, however, the agency has made progress on handling inquiries and processing claims, said state Sen. John J. Tassoni Jr., D-Smithfield.

Earlier this year, the agency was unable to keep up with a flood of calls, e-mails and claims as the state’s unemployment rate rose, angering and frustrating people who had lost their jobs.

Tassoni was a frequent critic of the Carcieri administration at the time, alleging that it had not done enough to address the problem.

Since then, the agency has hired and trained additional staff and has taken other steps to reduce backlogs, Tassoni said on Thursday.

At one time, Tassoni received hundreds of calls from unemployed people throughout the state who, unable to reach the agency’s call center, contacted him after seeing his name in the newspaper.

Now, “My calls have drastically decreased” as the situation at the state’s unemployment call center has improved, Tassoni said.

In an interview at agency headquarters in Cranston on Monday, Filippone and agency spokeswoman Laura Hart provided the following update:

•The average time that callers spend on hold when trying to reach the agency’s staff was about 28 minutes on June 10. That is down from 36 minutes in early April, and from more than two hours in January.

•The agency now takes about two days on average to process claims that are filed online for benefits. That compares with about three or four days in early April, and more than a month in January. (The backlog of claims stood at 300 on June 10, compared with 430 as of April 8, and 11,000 on Jan. 28.)

•The agency had a backlog of 72 e-mail inquiries involving unemployment benefits as of June 10. That is down from 165 on April 13, and nearly 2,500 as of Feb. 4. (It now takes about a day for the agency to respond to e-mail inquiries. That compares with two or three days in April, and several weeks in February.)

Filippone stressed that while the average amount of time that callers spend on hold has declined, the wait can vary from day to day.

For example, the wait could be longer than average on Mondays and Tuesdays, which are typically the busiest days for calls; it could be shorter on Fridays, when call volume typically drops, Filippone said.

The agency is also pursuing several changes involving technology that would, among other things, help speed processing of claims, Filippone and Hart said.

But the system faces a test in the weeks ahead as calls, e-mails and benefit claims rise, Filippone acknowledged.

One reason is that a number of manufacturers traditionally shut down each July for re-tooling and other reasons; workers are often laid off, at least temporarily, and seek unemployment benefits in the meantime, said Edward Mazze, distinguished professor and former dean of the University of Rhode Island’s College of Business Administration.

In addition, unemployment has risen: Rhode Island’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for May was 12.1 percent, up from 7.4 percent at the same point a year ago.

And more people are either out of work or will soon lose their jobs, Mazze said. They include teachers and other personnel whose contracts were not renewed by local school districts, colleges and universities, and employees at many nonprofit organizations that have had “substantial cash-flow problems” as traditional sources of funds, including charitable contributions, have dried up, Mazze said.

For the week ended June 6, about 33,800 people were collecting some type of unemployment benefit through the state Department of Labor and Training, up from about 12,000 at the same point a year ago.

During May, the agency distributed about $52.5 million in benefits, up from about $18.5 million in May 2008.

Benefits are normally paid from a trust fund that gets its money through a tax on employers.

But Rhode Island’s fund has been depleted; the agency has borrowed $70.27 million so far through the U.S. Department of Labor to help cover benefits.

All told, 15 states — including California, Michigan, New Jersey and New York — have loans outstanding from the federal Unemployment Account, according to a U.S. Department of Labor tally as of June 16.

ndowning@projo.com