Hi everyone! This is Dr. Nitin Chhoda and I have some surprising news in this
video. THOUSANDS of individuals,
beneficiaries of unemployment benefits, have actually been ORDERED by the state
to REPAY back a portion of those unemployment benefits, it's surprising. In
this video I'm going to talk to you about THREE things. I'm going to talk to
you about the trends and why beneficiaries nationwide are being asked
to repay their unemployment benefits in some instances. I'm actually going to
give you an analysis of a repayment order that one individual in Ohio
received. Finally, I'm going to talk to you about what you should be aware
about this going forward, why this happens, how you can prepare to make sure
that you know what lies ahead. If you're not an existing subscriber yet, please
consider clicking the subscribe button and please enable notifications and also
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Recent news reports suggest that 24,000 individuals in Ohio 35,000 individuals
in Virginia and over 46,000 individuals in Texas have been receiving ORDERS to
repay back some portion of their unemployment benefits. Now there are FOUR
reasons why individuals are getting a repayment order to pay back a portion in
many cases a significant portion of the unemployment benefits. These four reasons
are - Oversight, Misunderstanding, Fraud or Technical error. Now what does
oversight mean? Oversight simply means that they weren't paying attention the
state agency wasn't paying attention and just went ahead and process to the
unemployment benefits request without properly analyzing all the data that you
provided them. Now remember the state agencies are overwhelmed because they
have software limitations, they have staffing limitations and oversight which
means essentially them not paying attention and simply saying yes when you
shouldn't have gotten unemployment benefits or should have had reduced
unemployment benefits that's reason number 1. Reason number 2 is
misunderstanding you submitted the information correctly but through no
fault of your own. In other words there was a misunderstanding or a mistake on
the part of the state agency you were given unemployment benefits and that's
when they come back to recapture. Number 3 is outright fraud. If some
individuals provide wrong information about unemployment or provide
information that is fraudulent then that is
an actual legitimate reason for a recapture for a repayment order. And
number 4, a technical error. Let's say you submitted the correct information
through the website or through or through other other means of
communication with the state agency, there was some error where either they
didn't get the information or they misinterpreted the information and then
they ended up paying you more than you should have received and to be honest if
there's a mistake on the part of the state if there's a misunderstanding on
their part if there's a technical glitch, if there's oversight I don't think that
they should be recapturing the money because for 2 reasons, number 1, it's
not the fault of the individual getting the money and number 2 most
importantly individuals need these unemployment benefits specifically the
$600 week federal booster. So I personally don't think they should be
aggressive about recapturing but this is indeed happening and this is what I'm
reporting to you in this video in fact on your screen right now you'll
see a chart from the Ohio Department of jobs and Family Services this is the
total unemployment claims that have been filed and paid since March 15 now I'm
talking specifically about Ohio because the governor ordered all bars and
restaurants to close on the 15th of March now as of the last week of May
about half of the individuals who had placed claims only half of them had
received their first payment in fact if you take a look at this chart the
portion in blue is all of the individuals who file claims you can see
a lot of individuals have actually filed claims a portion in yellow eye
individuals who've actually been paid and the portion and purple corresponds
to the PUA payments the additional payments now let's look at the portion
in blue as you can see starting in April all the way through to me the number of
unemployment claims that were filed went all the way up to 1.3 million
individuals almost 1.3 million individuals filed for unemployment in
the state of Ohio and the number of individuals who were paid if you look at
the graph is significantly lower in fact as of the last week of May only six
hundred and forty-four thousand individuals had actually received money
now let's take a look at the POA applications starting in May and you can
see that there were over 200,000 POA applications and the data here suggest
that only 110,000 individuals had we received payment for the PUA the the
unemployment assistance now here's additional data from the Ohio
Department of jobs and Family Services tens of thousands of individuals who
should have been getting their unemployment benefits are actually
running into all sorts of problems you can see here that almost 50,000
individuals ran into some sort of a problem with the weekly claim 24,000
individuals are almost ran into a problem with overpayment they were paid
more and therefore there to be some element of recapture sixteen thousand
individuals haven't filed any claims and three thousand five hundred individuals
have a penalty week as punishment for falsely claiming a week so individuals
are running into all sorts of problems and now remember this is data from the
state of Ohio so there will be specific data like this that exists for your
state as well and this is affecting the lives of day to day individuals who
depend on these unemployment benefits in fact new station five in Ohio featured
Marni B hen a waitress from Buffalo Wild Wings she was ordered to pay back close
to three thousand dollars in unemployment benefits let's take a look
at what she had to say yesterday we told you about Marty being instead of much
needed help the Buffalo Wild Wings waitress received this in order to pay
back her unemployment benefits so far close to twenty four thousand unemployed
Ohioans received the same message state officials admit they are to blame
for errors that led to overpayments but it's laid off workers who must pay the
price today jobs and Family Services director Kimberly Hall told us a federal
rule requires recipients to pay back the money now an article on Cincinnati com
shared a copy of the order that this individual received and it's quite
surprising when you read it I mean it almost feels like a summons from court
so this is what she got and it said the claimant has been overpaid benefits to
which he or she was not entitled for reasons determined to be non fraud
denied the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services has disallowed the
claimants application for an employment compensation benefits
the 12th of April the claimant did not have at least twenty qualifying weeks of
employment that was subject to an unemployment compensation law or did not
on an average weekly wage and then it goes into all the additional details
about why these unemployment benefits need to be recaptured this is basically
a repayment order that this individual received and now this is the part that
really hurts the claimant has been overpaid benefits to which he or she was
not entitled for reasons determined to be non fraud denied in other words they
are saying that this individual you know didn't submit wrong information but
still the individual has to pay back money and it says the amount is almost
three thousand dollars and you can see on your screen where this notice this
order identifies the weeks where this individual was supposedly overpaid and
as you can see 18th of April seven hundred and thirty seven dollar
overpayment a similar overpayment on the 25th of April the 2nd of May and the 9th
of May it's it's just unbelievable and as if that wasn't enough this repayment
order includes specific repayment instructions in order to repay it says
the claimant is required to immediately repay the overpaid benefits and any
mandatory penalty identified above he or she should mail a check and it gives it
gives the individual the mailing address and it's also says you can pay by credit
card and it also says any outstanding benefit balance will be recovered by the
withholding of any future benefits to which the claimant becomes entitled so
they will actually recapture money from future benefits if they are not paid
outstanding penalties and interest are not subject to future benefit
withholding but will be referred to the Ohio Attorney General's office for
collection if payments are not made in accordance with this notice balances I
immediately do upon receipt so you can see that state unemployment agencies
that are basically strapped for cash are sending out these notices when they
detect that they have paid unemployment benefits that were not supposed to be
paid now if you are receiving unemployment benefits you need to make
sure that you provided the state with accurate information and also get in
touch with the state agency to make sure that they have processed your claim
correctly or they are about to process your claim correctly because if there is
a mistake at their end they simply try to recapture the money based on what
happened to this the Vigilant based on this news
reporting I don't want this to happen to any of my subscribers I don't want
anyone to be subjected to some sort of a recapture or a repayment order speaking
of repayment order the repayment order towards the end says in addition to the
overpayment of benefits and penalty the claimant may also be subject to the
following actions through the Ohio Attorney General's Office if full
repayment is not made within 45 days of the notice I mean this feels like a
collection letter it says the state or federal income tax withholding may
happen and the Ohio Attorney General's collection costs and possible court
costs may be something that the individual is subjected to I mean it
just it's surprising it blows my mind reading a repayment order like that like
I said it feels like a collection notice it almost feels like a court summons and
no one no one should be on the other side of this repayment order now as a
subscriber my recommendation to you would be to number one if you're
collecting unemployment save as much money as you can because you're going to
be subjected to taxes at some point in the future and I have done another
training video on unemployment tax so you definitely want to check that out
in the unemployment benefits crash course you could be subjected to some
form of withholding it's always better to have a good and safe cash buffer a
financial buffer if you will so that you're prepared for any eventuality we
live in uncertain times and the best way you can prepare for this uncertain time
and what could potentially be an uncertain future especially the
unemployment benefits are not extended beyond the end of July what you need to
do to prepare find uncertain future is to have some cash savings so that that
can give you the cushion the flexibility the peace of mind to be able to get
through tough times if they come thank you so much for watching if you learn
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thanks