General EUC Discussion - Ongoing

Unemployed In Orlando wrote:Im pretty confident there will be no retro pay, just an established eligibility date.

Why do you say that? I thought bill became law and eligibilty established with signing by Pres.

Judy wrote:

Unemployed In Orlando wrote:Im pretty confident there will be no retro pay, just an established eligibility date.

Why do you say that? I thought bill became law and eligibilty established with signing by Pres.

Yes but I doubt you will receive a retro payment for back weeks as you had mentioned prior. The only reason this was done with EB was because of the computer reprogramming and the fact this was a state sponsored extension. EUC is federal and whats not clear at this time is if the time frame for AWI to get their systems updated once they get for from the Dept of Labor in order to start processing claims.

Judy wrote:
...I have been doing some thinking on this and the way I figure it ( and I can no doubt be verrrrry wrong), those that have run out of all benefits would qualify immediately for the "14th" week since the bill was signed before the Saturday cutoff for this week. However, we wouldn't qualify for the 1st 2 weeks of Tier 3 until 2 weeks from today. ...

Sorry, that may seem logical but I'm afraid it's a bit of wishful thinking. The actual law reads: "...no amount shall be payable by virtue of such amendments with respect to any week of unemployment commencing before the date of the enactment of this Act."

So our first possible payable week is this coming week, whenever AWI gets around to actually allowing us to certify for it.

There is no "retro" in the sense that this bill does not allow states to go back to the date that an individual's benefits were exhausted, but there's no reason to think that there wouldn't be "retro" to the date of the bill's passage, or more accurately to start with November 8. That's what was done with the first Tier extension in the fall of '08, and probably will give us a few weeks of back benefits by the time we get to certify. That's not 100% for sure until the state says so, but they really have everything to gain from the feds and nothing to lose by giving us the most the feds have to offer, i.e., start with the week starting Nov 8. (But it doesn't go back to this week, sorry.)

Agreed, at best they might allow a person to claim weeks from this week (which isnt set in stone), but as I had said, no way they are going back to the claims exhaustion date.

since this EUC and not EB are they even going to bother with us entering work search data? I read the bill on the open congress web site and I didn't see anything about it. if we don't then it would be less of a pain, but at the same time it would make all the struggle we went through with last extension in vain.

whydoes awi site say that tier 3 is 13 weeks and we wont get tier 4 because we cant use tier 3 by dec 2009???????thf is that why did they do all that work and know one can recieve can anyone explain????????????????????????????

this is what awi says on there site
◦Creates up to 20 weeks of additional unemployment benefits. However, this is time limited because the date for establishing eligibility under the Emergency Unemployment Compensation (EUC) Program was not extended beyond December 27, 2009 that was established under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
•Increases the maximum EUC Tier II from 13 weeks to 14 weeks of benefits in all states, and this Tier is no longer tied to the state reaching a specified level of unemployment;
•Creates an EUC Tier III to provide up to 13 additional weeks of benefits in states with a total unemployment rate of at least 6 percent;
•Creates an EUC Tier IV to provide up to 6 additional weeks of benefits in states with a total unemployment rate of at least 8.5 percent.

t haught we already did tier 2 and did anyone read the bill? because i taught the dates were changed....i am so confused and desperate i have no money and dont have any idea what to expect here!!!!!!!!!! can anyone give me any closure?????????

Unemployed In Orlando wrote:Agreed, at best they might allow a person to claim weeks from this week (which isnt set in stone), but as I had said, no way they are going back to the claims exhaustion date.

Thanks, UIO and Nancy,

What you both have said is pretty close to what I was saying but more clearly. At best, I figured this week in which the bill was signed and made law (week ending 9/7/09) would be the FIRST week payable - not any further back. I know we are in a "wait and see" mode right now, but it is hard to believe that it would not become effective (eligible) with the date signed. However, stranger things have happened.

Judy

tj21121008 wrote:this is what awi says on there site
◦Creates up to 20 weeks of additional unemployment benefits. However, this is time limited because the date for establishing eligibility under the Emergency Unemployment Compensation (EUC) Program was not extended beyond December 27, 2009 that was established under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
•Increases the maximum EUC Tier II from 13 weeks to 14 weeks of benefits in all states, and this Tier is no longer tied to the state reaching a specified level of unemployment;
•Creates an EUC Tier III to provide up to 13 additional weeks of benefits in states with a total unemployment rate of at least 6 percent;
•Creates an EUC Tier IV to provide up to 6 additional weeks of benefits in states with a total unemployment rate of at least 8.5 percent.

t haught we already did tier 2 and did anyone read the bill? because i taught the dates were changed....i am so confused and desperate i have no money and dont have any idea what to expect here!!!!!!!!!! can anyone give me any closure?????????

I could use some clarity on this too if anyone knows. My brother is currently on Tier I - his last payable week under Tier 1 is week ending Dec 19 with first week of eligibily for Tier II being week starting 12/20. Will he "beat the deadline"? I have been trying to call Melody and her group but keep getting voice mail.

Thanks for any help you can provide.

If you scroll further down the page at AWI, there is an updated FAQ which is quite informative.

I found this in the FAQ:

When does Tier III Emergency Benefits period begin?
The new law is effective for weeks of unemployment beginning November 8, 2009. The first week that Tier III EUC can be paid is the week ending November 14, 2009.

So, maybe UIO and I are right in that Tier III is separate from week 14 of Tier II which would have to come BEFORE Tier III and would make week ending 11/7 payable. What do you think?

tj21121008 wrote:this is what awi says on there site
◦Creates up to 20 weeks of additional unemployment benefits. However, this is time limited because the date for establishing eligibility under the Emergency Unemployment Compensation (EUC) Program was not extended beyond December 27, 2009 that was established under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

What!?!?! there's a cut off date of December 27, 2009 for establishing eligibiltiy? My benefits run out January 2, 2010 does this mean I won't be eligible for this extension? This bill was passed for those whose benefits run out at the end of the year or after. How can there be a 12/27/09 time limit?

Anyone know the correct interpretation of this statement? Thanks.

I believe if you are now getting EUC or EB or you have exhausted EUC or EB the December cutoff does not effect you and you are eligible for this new 20 week extension--I believe Nancym posted that info on page 16 0f the legislative thread

connorsgp wrote:I believe if you are now getting EUC or EB or you have exhausted EUC or EB the December cutoff does not effect you and you are eligible for this new 20 week extension--I believe Nancym posted that info on page 16 0f the legislative thread

Thanks, connorsgrp, you're right I found the post by nancym on page 16 of the legislative thread:

nancym wrote:Please, everyone here who is on EB, EUC, or has already exhausted EB or EUC, let's clear up any concern about news you hear about December deadlines--DO NOT WORRY ABOUT THIS!

Those deadline dates are for those who have not yet been able to claim EUC or EB, and I know there are a few here on this board in that situation. But for all the rest, the long term unemployed, this bill extends those 20 weeks (for Florida) across that December cutoff, and in fact has nothing to do with that cutoff.

NELP is still working to get other legislation to help those affected by that cutoff, and also the cutoff for that extra $25, which occurs I believe around June 2010 or something like that. So we can watch to see if Congress gets to this new legislation before recess or attends to it right after the New Year, but for now we long term unemployed can breathe a little.

I guess one has to have a law degree (which I do not! ) to interpret the language!

New here. I was drawing my last EUC when I finally landed a job. I had to wait 2 weeks to start. Then the state of Florida passed the EB, and I got paid for those 2 weeks also, because I had a start date. I was originally laid off in March of 2007!

My husband has been laid off since November of 2008. I've been dealing with this for almost 2 years now, and it gets tiring when state agencies post incorrect information. I wonder if posting inaccuracies is better than not posting anything at all?

I waded through the bills, all the way back to the Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2008 (H.R.2642 of the 110th congress).

This information posted on AWI's website in not correct:

"What is the amount of Emergency Unemployment Compensation benefits I will be paid?
The weekly benefit amount will be the same as the amount of the newest eligible regular UC claim. The total benefits will be equal to the lesser of 50% of the original available credits of the regular claim or 13 weeks. If you exhaust EUC Tier III by December 27, 2009, eligibility can be established under EUC Tier IV. EUC Tier IV will provide the lesser of 24% of the available credits of the regular UC claim or up to 6 weeks."

The new legislation is for those who have exhausted their REGULAR benefits by December 27, 2009, not their EMERGENCY benefits (ie. Tier II or Tier III). This is why this is so frustrating.

Under section 4007 of the abovementioned act, entitled "Applicability", Part (b)(2):

"LIMIT ON COMPENSATION - No compensation shall be payable by reasojn of paragraph (1) for any week beginning after June 30, 2009."

This date was changed (notice I didn't use the misleading term "extended") by the ARRA (H.R.1 of the 111th congress) to May 31, 2010.

So my understanding is that if you've exhausted your REGULAR benefits before December 27, 2009, you will be eligible for ALL of the Tiers, but not for any weeks after May 31, 2010.

There's also language stating that if the Tier amount has been added to your account before the deadline, it will continue to pay out, but not after May 31, 2010. This is the next mountain to climb for our illustrious congress, so that the newly laid off will be entitled to Emergecy Benefits, if and only if the unemployment rate does not start to come down quickly.

Comments? I have to go to work, but will check back later tonight or tomorrow am.

Bittybear

[Editor: Moved from Senate bills, etc. to this thread for EUC discussion--nancym 11/8/09]

Unemployed In Orlando wrote:

MiamiVice wrote:Hello UIO i finally found the place to be! Yes! listen, when they are talking about 20 weeks. does that mean we will get the amount of monies that belong in 20 weeks? oh boy, am i confused here, because my last EB i only got about 4.500, so if they go by the last EB amount i won't get no 20 weeks, i think the person that told me that is not very knowledgeable about this, it does not make sense to go by the EB amount, right? I HOPE NOT. Please let me know at your convenience!

Well, if you figure by the max EB amount, you received 4500, roughly 80% of the max EB amount. When the EUC last year was put in place the first tier was 50% of your original claim not to exceed 13 weeks(which was in July 2008), the 2nd tier EUC was 80% of your original claim not to exceed 20 weeks(which was in November 2008).

Using that math, and the fact that the EUC would be up to 20 weeks, its pretty safe to say that you can approximate your new EUC amount by taking 80% of your original claim and then dividing by $275 to determine the amount of weeks you will receive with this latest EUC extension since this is exactly how the last EUC was determined.

For people who cant find your original claim amount or who cant do the math, then I suggest you wait till this bill walks through the appropriate steps and I am sure AWI will mail you a notice advising on how many weeks you are eligible for.

Also one thing to keep in mind, those who received EUC last year, one of the req with the last round of EUC is that you started a claim after May 2, 2006. Now if that date moves ahead about a year or 15 months to say May 2007+ beats me although I doubt people who have been unemployed 3 1/2 years would be able to get this round

Can anyone clarify the part of this quote in cyan??? According to the AWI FAQs, Tier III/IV benefits are 50% and 24%.

Thanks

nancym wrote:.

2) NELP has cleared up some confusion on their NELP.org site (link to the unemployed workers site from their main page) about concerns about the December deadlines talked about on the forums. Essentially they explain that we don't have to worry about that, if we qualify for the 14 weeks, we will get the extra 6, assuming the unemployment rate stays above 8.5%. (Can anyone imagine that rate dropping so fast in the next 6-12 months? In our dreams.) We're "grandfathered in," so to speak.

Bottom line: if you got Tier 1, you get these new Tiers, 20 weeks (or whatever percentage you are entitled to if you have not had the maximum in your account for the previous extensions).

They added the 1 additional week to the Tier II benefits for a reason I've have yet to determine, but it has a specific target.

UIO had posted in another topic about the AWI site stating you have to exhaust your Tier II benefits before December 27, 2009 in order to qualify for Tier III and (possibly) Tier IV.

My understanding is that they added the additional week so that the more recently laid off would not run out before the states get everything up and running. They also eliminated the condition of a state being designated as in an "extended benefit period" (there's that misleading mixing up of terms again - extended vs emergency).

The new bill also lowered the trigger amount to designate a state as in an "extended benefit perior", from 6.5 to 6.0 percent.

What that says to me is that anyone who is laid off, regardless of whether or not the state has a high rate (14 weeks of emergency benefits for the unemployed in ALL states, and 6 more for those in states with high unemployment), will get Tier I and Tier II. Tier I was increased from the original 13 to 20 weeks, and now Tier II is increased from the original 13 to 14 weeks.

Remember, all of this is done in several separate bills. The first one declared the fact that the unemployment rate was such that they needed to pay "emergency" benefits, the second extended the first amount and added Tier II. The ARRA changed to expiration dates, and the last one added Tiers III and IV. Notice the last bill did not have anything in it regarding dates.

Bittybear

i know we will get the 14 weeks but will we get the 6 weeks because it is another tier and we cant file it until after the 14 weeks and that is after dec ????????????uio can you clarify is for me???????????????

Judy wrote:

So, maybe UIO and I are right in that Tier III is separate from week 14 of Tier II which would have to come BEFORE Tier III and would make week ending 11/7 payable. What do you think?

Judy, please re-read the actual text of the bill that I posted earlier: "...no amount shall be payable by virtue of such amendments with respect to any week of unemployment commencing before the date of the enactment of this Act."

We cannot by law be paid earlier than the week that starts AFTER the signing of the bill. If we were to be paid for the week ending 11/7, that would be the week commencing November 1, not covered in this bill at all, no matter which Tier is at issue. Expect to be covered for weeks starting the week of Nov 8; that's exactly how the Tiers that started last year were handled also.

i know we will get the 14 weeks but will we get the 6 weeks because it is another tier and we cant file it until after the 14 weeks and that is after dec ????????????uio can you clarify is for me???????????????.

tj21121008 wrote:i know we will get the 14 weeks but will we get the 6 weeks because it is another tier and we cant file it until after the 14 weeks and that is after dec ????????????uio can you clarify is for me???????????????.

You WILL get the extra 6 weeks, assuming Florida remains at or above 8.5% 3-month average rate at the time you run out of the 14 weeks. The chances of Florida regaining enough jobs to get us lower than that rate by then I would say are below zero. So all other factors being equal (you have not had any work, etc.), you will continue on into the 6 weeks.

Please refer to the post I made earlier from NELP: http://www.unemployedworkers.org/sites/unemployedworkers/index.php/benefits

Note especially the third paragraph. Also note the first payable week in the paragraph above that.

Also, in regard to your earlier comment about the work search being "in vain"--it wasn't in vain, it was just the legal requirement for that particular law. (Though I admit many applications we make nowadays are "in vain"!)

This new bill is EUC so there most likely will be no work search reporting (though AWI always requires that you look for work, so I would continue keeping those records of job apps as you go along in case of a random audit). Even though the bill is funded as EUC, it is triggered by the "EB period" status of a state.

Thanks Nancy, was going to reference that. Been out of the house all day

bittybear--

Thanks for posting, but there are just a few parts of your post that I would like to clear up here, since there has been so much confusion going around still.

bittybear wrote:
My understanding is that they added the additional week so that the more recently laid off would not run out before the states get everything up and running.

No such humanitarian reasons on the part of our Congress, I'm afraid. They added this extra week in order to avoid chaos for the states, who are already running concurrent programs (regular, Tiers 1 and 2, EB, and now this new bill's Tiers). The compromise from the Senate provides for 14 extra weeks for ALL states and an extra 6 in a Tier 4 for the high rate states. So to make this coincide more sensibly with current programs, they just added one week to the existing Tier 2 and the remaining 13 make up a new Tier 3. (They give us our one oddball week to make up our full 14 either before or after the 13 for Tier 3.) Otherwise, the states would have to program some kind of Tier 2 A and B or some darn thing, and we might never EVER be able to get anyone on the phone at AWI!

bittybear wrote:
...The new bill also lowered the trigger amount to designate a state as in an "extended benefit period", from 6.5 to 6.0 percent.
What that says to me is that anyone who is laid off, regardless of whether or not the state has a high rate (14 weeks of emergency benefits for the unemployed in ALL states, and 6 more for those in states with high unemployment), will get Tier I and Tier II. Tier I was increased from the original 13 to 20 weeks, and now Tier II is increased from the original 13 to 14 weeks.

True, although Tier 1 has been 20 weeks ever since they added the extra 7 weeks in Nov '08. Tier 4 still has a trigger requirement for being in an "extended benefit period" that is 8.5% or above TUR in a 3-month average. (Florida will probably meet that requirement for a long time into next year and maybe beyond.)

bittybear wrote:What that says to me is that anyone who is laid off, regardless of whether or not the state has a high rate (14 weeks of emergency benefits for the unemployed in ALL states, and 6 more for those in states with high unemployment), will get Tier I and Tier II. Notice the last bill did not have anything in it regarding dates..

It's true that for all of us who are among the long term unemployed, having exhausted or about to exhaust all benefits, these 14 and 6 weeks will be available; the wording of the bill even provides for a few states that never got Tier 2 under the old law to now get 14 weeks in Tier 2. And thanks for pointing out that the new bill says nothing about deadlines.

However, not everyone coming after us will be so lucky. There are cutoff dates for funding the entire EUC program that will come up AFTER all of us have used up our 20 weeks; those coming later will run up against the cutoff date for payments for the whole EUC program, which is still June 6, 2010, and initial eligibility for the first Tier is cut off at December 26, 2009. Not only that, but 100% federal funding for the EB program is cut off on January 1, 2010. So unless the states want to pay 50-50 for it, individual EB benefits may be either cut off or switched to the new Tiers. States may vary on how they handle this if no new federal legislation is passed.

THAT's why the states are posting these disclaimer type statements on their websites about new legislation being needed, etc., alarming many but technically correct if they are addressing ALL the unemployed. There are other provisions of the ARRA bill that will expire as well--the $25 extra (July 3, '09), and the Cobra benefit, for example. So watch for new legislation, not for our 20 weeks if you already qualify, but for the larger group of unemployed to follow, to say nothing of possible legislation to create jobs!

"dondk" over at Open Congress posted this, and I thought it was a really good way to explain HR 3548 in terms of your eligibility for Tier 3 and 4, so I'm posting it here for you all:

"You are missing the premise of EUC 3 and 4. EUC 3 is based ONLY on the exhaustion of EUC 2. If you are on EB, you have exhausted EUC 2, thus you are entitled to EUC 3.

once again, EUC 3 is based on the individual and nothing else. So, for all those people wondering about EUC 3, the ONLY question you need to ask yourselves is... did I exhaust EUC 2. if the answer is YES, then EUC 3 is yours.

EB and EUC 4 are STATE dependent. Which means, the state the individual is getting UE benefits from, MUST be above 8.0% for EB and 8.5% for EUC 4.

Now, IF the state is ABOVE that criteria, THEN (individual criteria is taken into account) the individual MUST have exhausted EUC 2 for EB, the individual MUST exhaust EUC 3 for EUC 4."

is that clear now? anyone who is presently on or has exhausted EB is getting EUC 3.

And I should add here--you get EUC3 even if the state cuts off your EB because of the funding deadline at the beginning of January. We don't know how the states will handle someone whose EB overlaps that date, but even if you lose out on some or all of EB, you get the EUC Tier 3 as long as you exhausted EUC2.

(Personally it would be fine with me if they never renew EB, but kept adding EUC instead--less hassle all around!)

Agreed with the comment about no more EB and on to EUC!! Two thumbs up!

Having posted all that above, I have to say the AWI FAQ that is now posted is actually pretty clear about a lot of this:
http://www.floridajobs.org/unemployment/EUC_09/index.html

(scroll down to bottom of that page)