October saw a seasonally-adjusted decrease of 3,700 people signing on the Live Register, it was revealed today.
The total has now been reduced to 409,900 in seasonally-adjusted terms, according to the Central Statistics Office.
In unadjusted terms, there were 396,512 people signing on last month, an annual decrease of 23,660 (-5.6%).
This is the first month since May 2009 that the unadjusted Live Register total has been below 400,000.
The standardised unemployment rate in October 2013 was 13.2%, down from 13.3% in September 2013.
The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate from the most recent Quarterly National Household Survey (QNHS) was 13.7% in the second quarter of 2013.
The Live Register includes part-time workers (up to three days a week), seasonal and casual workers entitled to Jobseeker’s Benefit (JB) or Jobseeker’s Allowance (JA).
Unemployment is measured by the Quarterly National Household Survey and the latest estimated number of ppeople unemployed as of the second quarter of 2013 was 300,700.