After 53 weeks of the pandemic, many Georgians are reaching the end of the normally allotted time period for receiving unemployment insurance (UI) benefits. Claimants who filed an individual claim and have reached the end of their benefit year should file a new claim to continue receiving payments. A benefit year is the 52-week period beginning on the Sunday of the week a new claim is filed. Once this time period expires, claimants must reapply for benefits reporting any additional work history, including temporary, part-time, self-employment, or W-2 work. Once the new regular UI claim is processed, claimants who are unable to establish a valid regular UI claim will be placed back into the appropriate federal CARES Act program for benefits to continue. If a claimant’s employer is filing an employer filed claim on his/her behalf and he/she reaches the end of the 52-week period, the benefit year will renew the following week when the employer requests a weekly payment for the employee. Information on benefit year ending dates can be found on the GDOL website at https://dol.georgia.gov/blog-post/benefit-year-end-bye-dates.
“We are now seeing claimants who have received payments for more than 52 weeks who are reapplying for UI benefits,” said Commissioner Butler. “ We will continue to issue payments while also working to transition claimants into the almost 222,000 jobs available on Employ Georgia.”
Today, 221,907 job listings are online at https://bit.ly/36EA2vk for Georgians to access. These listings could include multiple positions for each job indicating a much higher number of jobs available. The GDOL offers online resources for finding a job, building a resume, and assisting with other reemployment needs. Resources for reemployment assistance along with information on filing an unemployment claim and details on how employers can file partial claims can be found on the agency’s webpage at https://bit.ly/2ZudL0c.
Last week, the GDOL dispersed over $304 million UI benefits including regular UI, Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation (PEUC), Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA), Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (FPUC), State Extended Benefits (SEB), and Lost Wages Assistance (LWA) supplements. Since March 21, 2020, the GDOL has issued payments totaling $19,948,643,020.
Since the beginning of the pandemic in March of last year, the GDOL has processed 4,547,688 regular UI initial claims, more than the combined last nine years prior to the pandemic (4.0 million). Last week, regular UI initial claims totaled 24,789, up 89 over the week. Additionally, the agency currently has 326,613 active PUA claims.
The sectors with the most weekly regular UI initial claims processed included Accommodation and Food Services, 6,535, Administrative and Support Services, 2,720, Manufacturing, 2,706, Retail Trade, 1,811, and Health Care, 1,618.
The number of initial claims filed throughout the United States for the week ending March 20 was 684,000, a decrease of 97,000 from the previous week’s revised level of 781,000.
UI benefits are taxable income and 1099-G tax forms are issued in accordance with federal law to report payments and all taxes withheld during each tax year. If you received a 1099-G tax form and did not file a UI claim yourself or your employer did not file one on your behalf, you may be the victim of UI fraud and should report the incident on the GDOL website at https://www.dol.state.ga.us/public/uiben/fraud/reportType. Select Report 1099 ID Theft at the bottom and follow the instructions. If you received a 1099-G tax form and returned the benefits or wish to return the benefits, please see detailed instructions on next steps at https://dol.georgia.gov/blog/form-1099-g-tax-information.
For more information on jobs and current labor force date, visit the Georgia Labor Force Market Explorer at https://bit.ly/3ayIPjd to view a comprehensive report.