Hey, guys, it's Ginny Silver.
And today I want to talk to those of you in the state of
California who are reaching the end of your unemployment
or pandemic unemployment related benefits.
Now, many of you are reaching the end of your unemployment
benefits for a few different reasons.
You may be reaching the end of your benefit year, you may
be approaching the zero dollar balance, or you may be approaching
that coin week ending September fourth end date for pandemic
related programs.
Well, I want to walk you through the different scenarios
and what is next for each type of claim.
First, Let's talk about those of you who are UI, PEUC, or
Fed Ed and are reaching the end of your benefit year.
The Edd States that your benefit year expires 12 months after
your claim start date.
In order to locate this, go to UI online, look at your claim
start date and count 12 months out.
On June five, the Edd has implemented a new policy regarding
reaching the end of your benefit year when you reach the
end of your benefit year.
One of 2 scenarios will apply to you.
The first of these two scenarios is that you will have to
file a new claim when you reach the end of your benefit year.
If your UI, PEUC, or Fed Ed and you reach the end of your
benefit year and you worked within the last 18 months and
have enough earnings in order to potentially establish a
new claim, the Edd requires you to file a new claim when
you reach the end of your benefit year.
Now, the Edd States that you will be able to click the File,
a new application button and UI online, and you can only
proceed with the application if you are required to file
a new claim.
In addition to simply trying to file a new claim and seeing
if it is rejected or accepted, make sure that you also utilize
the EDD's Benefit Calculator tool.
Enter in your earnings for the base period prior to filing
for unemployment, and the calculator will show you if you
had enough earnings in order to qualify for a new claim.
Once you have filed your new application, allow up to three
weeks for the Edd to process that application.
If approved, you will receive an award letter stating your
new weekly benefit award amount.
Now, some of you may be awarded a new weekly benefit award
amount that is significantly less than your prior unemployment
claim amount.
Well, if you are awarded a new claim before that September
fourth end date for the PEUC extension, and previously we're
collecting UI or PEUC, then you may qualify for the Deferred
new claim program, which means that the Edd will take your
new weekly benefit award amount, which is 25 dollars last
or even smaller, and then we'll put it on hold.
They will then apply a PEUC extension of your old weekly benefit
award amount to your old claim and allow you to collect that
until claim week ending September fourth.
When puns after PEUC ends on claim week ending September fourth
, then the Edd will take your new claim that you qualified
for, which was placed on hold and they will apply it to your
account who are awarded a brand new claim.
You are placed on that brand new claim and you certify on
that new claim.
Keep in mind that those certifications will be pending for
the first up to three weeks while your new claim is sent
out to a third party company for an initial fraud review.
These additional fraud reviews are done through a company
called Thompson Routers in order to prevent fraudulent claims.
Now, the first round of certifications on a brand new claim
are going to be pending for the first up to three weeks.
Why?
Because the Edd sends out your claim to third party company
called Thompson Routers for additional fraud checks during
this point in time.
There's nothing that Edd can do in order to push you from
pending to Paid because they are waiting on those additional
fraud checks to be completed by the third party company.
The claim comes back and it has passed the fraud review from
the third party company.
Then your pending payments will move to Paid.
So what about those of you that did not work in the prior
18 months or you did not earn enough in order to establish
a new claim?
Well, as of June, it the Edd no longer requires you to file
a new claim if you did not work in the last 18 months.
The Edd States that when you click on file a new claim, your
application should be automatically rejected and you should
not be able to proceed with submitting a new application.
Edd States they will process applying the PEUC extension to
your claim automatically and you should continue to certify.
Next, Let's talk about those of you that are on Pua.
Pua Pandemic Unemployment Assistance will End Claim Week
Ending September fourth PUA was created by federal legislation
of the stimulus bills and the program is set to end claim
week ending September fourth.
Unless there is some form of new legislation proposed, passed
and signed into law, Pua will cease to exist.
Claim Week Ending September fourth Even if you have a remaining
balance in PUA, you will be unable to continue to collect
unless additional legislation I passed.
The same is true for PE/uC extensions.
Claim week ending September fourth will be the last week
that you'll be able to certify for and collect on a PEUC extension,
since PEUC extensions are also a product of stimulus legislation.
If you're on PEUC and you have a remaining balance after the
end date of September fourth, you will no longer be able
to collect that balance because the program will cease to
exist. If you are PEUC, Fed Ed, Ui and reach a zero dollar balance
before claim week ending September fourth, then you will
be able to collect any remaining weeks of PEUC extensions
which apply up until claim week ending September fourth.
While PEUC is still active up until September fourth, you
will be able to collect the next phase of PEUC uses awarded
in three different phases.
The first phase is called PEUC and it is 13 weeks.
Once you exhaust that balance all the way down to zero, you
are next awarded the second phase of the PEUC extension, which
is called Tier two, or if you call into customer service,
they call it PEUX.
This second phase of the PEUC extension last 11 weeks, and
once you exhaust that balance all the way down to zero, you
will then be awarded the third and final phase of the PEUC
extension, which is called PEUC Tier two Augmentation, or
if you call into customer service, they call it Puy.
This last phase lasts up to 29 weeks, but all of the PEUC
extensions have a hard end date of claim week ending September
fourth.
Next, what about those of you that are a zero dollar balance
where UI, PEUC, or Fed Ed who are waiting a PEUC extension but
have not received it?
If you have been waiting longer than two weeks at a zero
dollar balance without being extended, then it is time to
contact the Edd.
They should be processing these PEUC extensions within about
one to 2 weeks after you reach a zero dollar balance, but
Unfortunately they are not applying these automatically to
everyone's claim consistently.
If you've been at zero for longer than two weeks, then contacts
the Edd or contact your Assembly member for those of you
collecting UI or PEC.
Once we reach claim week ending September fourth and the
PEUC extension has ended, UI and PEUC claimants may potential
qualify to receive a Fed Ed extension.
A Fed Ed extension is California's extended unemployment
benefits, and there are a series of requirements that must
be met in order to receive a Fed Ed extension.
Number one, In order to receive feed, the Fed Ed program
must be activated.
There are two different ways that Fed Ed can be active.
Number one is if the California state unemployment rate remains
at 6% or higher.
If it remains at 6% or higher than Fed Ed is active.
Feed is also activated when the States ensured unemployment
rate equals or exceeds 5% and is at least 120% higher than
the average unemployment rate for the same period in the
two previous years.
After the additional seven week extended benefit duration
of the Pandemic related stimulus provisions, Fed Ed will
decrease back down to a 13 week program as long as this unemployment
rate in the state remains at 6% or more or 5%, but is at
least 120% higher than the average you are for the same period
in the previous two years.
Now, if Fed Ed is active, the next requirement is that you
must qualify in order to receive Fed Ed.
Now, in order to qualify to receive Fed Ed, you must have
a regular unemployment insurance claim that started on or
after May 19th.
2019.
You must have used all benefits on your UI claim and the
PEUC extension or your claim has expired.
You do not qualify for a new UI claim in California or any
other state, and you are not disqualified and you meet the
UI eligibility requirements.
You must have made enough ear in the base period of your
regular UI claim to qualify.
Now, keep in mind that your base period is the four quarters
worth of earnings prior to being unemployed that your claims
weekly benefit of word amount is based on.
This is either going to be a standard base period or an alternative
base period.
In order to qualify, your total base period earnings must
be more than either of these two calculations, 40 times the
weekly benefit amount or 1.5 times the earnings in the highest
quarter of the base period of your regular UI claim.
Now, if your weekly benefit award amount is 450 dollars and
you multiply that times 40, that's going to equal 18,000
dollars. If in your base period your total earnings were
more than that 40 times your weekly benefit award amount
in this example, over 18,000 dollars, then you would qualify.
The other way to qualify requires you to take your highest
quarter worth of earnings and multiply it by 1.5.
If your base period earnings is more than either one of these
two calculations, then you would qualify to receive Fed Ed.
There's one other program that you may qualify for in order
to receive additional benefits after your unemployment claim
ends. PEUC is no longer activated and Fed Ed is no longer
activated or you do not qualify, and that is a California
training extension.
Keep in mind this only applies to UI claimants and not Pua
claimants. Why?
Because PUA will cease to exist come claim week ending September
fourth.
A California training extension allows unemployed individuals
to continue to collect unemployment benefits while they return
to fulltime school or training so that they can obtain training
in order to reenter the workforce.
In order to qualify, you must have a current and valid unemployment
insurance claim.
You must meet all eligibility criteria to receive UI benefits.
You must start training before the current claim expires.
You must be approved by the Edd for one of the training categories
under CTB.
You must contact Edd before your 16th week of benefit payments.
If the maximum award of your claim is less than 16 weeks
of benefit payments, you must contact before your claim reaches
a balance of 0. 16th week.
This is not going to apply to some of you that are on older
claims, but if you recently awarded a new claim, contacts
the Edd by your 16th week.
If you're going to be entering into full time training or
school, and you would like to see if you qualify for a training
extension in order to inquire about a training extension.
You're going to report the start date of training.
When you file a reopen a claim, submit a question through
UI under the category School or Training in Topic California
Training Benefits.
I'm going to also be creating a series of videos for those
of you who are looking for work who are getting ready to
reenter the workforce surrounding tools and resources to
help you to land a job.
Additionally, for those of you that are ready to reenter
self employment or are looking to start self employment for
the first time, I'm going to be creating additional updated
content on selfemployment resources.
Okay, you guys, I hope that was helpful.
Please click Like Subscribe and leave me a comment down.