Today, the Nevada Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation (DETR) provided the following updates and statements on the federal unemployment programs expanded by HR 133, Continued Assistance Act (CAA) of 2021. The CAA expands all federal programs from with December 27, 2020 until the week ending March 13, 2021.
“We know how important these extended benefits are for Nevadans, and ensuring that they receive them is our number one priority. We are working as fast as we can to implement all federal benefit programs, but we need time to do this in both systems and to ask for public patience as we move forward in providing critical assistance to Nevadans, ”said Elisa Cafferata. Director of the Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation.
PUA within CAA:
The CARES law created the PUA program in 2020. Self-employed people and concert workers could collect up to a total of 39 weeks of benefits. And the original PUA program expired on December 26, 2020.
For the PUA, the CAA added 11 weeks to the number of weeks the claimant can receive benefits for a total of 50 weeks in the PUA.
Unlike the regular UI program, the PUA program has a expiration date. Under the CAA, eligible claimants could collect benefits until 10 April 2021 or for a maximum of 50 weeks, whichever comes first.
States with high unemployment rates can offer a one-week extension of 7 weeks, which some PUA applicants began receiving in 2020. The Department of Labor asked Nevada to “disable” this extension for PUA when the program expired on December 26, 2020. Unfortunately, this complication delayed the full implementation of the 11-week extension for the AAP.
Status: DETR is working with our provider to ensure that eligible claimants can get their weekly benefits for the full 11 weeks of retroactive CAA PUA benefits until December 27, 2020. DETR anticipates that claimants will see these additional weeks on their portals before the end of the month. .
PEUC for common IU:
The CAA added 11 weeks of benefits for eligible UI beneficiaries.
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Status: In regular UI, coding and testing of the 11-week PEUC extension is ongoing. We found that additional scheduling was needed to track when applicants exhausted the first 13 weeks of PEUC under the CARES Act before they switched to the 11 weeks PEUC under the Continuing Care Act. This computer programming is now being tested. As soon as we pass the test, we can implement it and the payments will start to go out. Applicants will receive all the weeks to which they are entitled by continuing to submit their weekly complaints.
FPUC for regular UI and for PUA:
The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act reintroduced the Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (FPUC) program, providing an additional weekly benefit of $ 300 for applications paid for the weeks of December 27, 2020 through the week ending March 13 2021.
Status: This benefit programming was implemented in most programs, and payments were issued together with unemployment benefits for eligible applicants in both the UI and the AAP, without any further action on the part of the claimants.
Applicants awaiting updated scheduling to receive extended benefits from the Continuing Assistance Act will receive weeks back from the FPUC for which they are eligible because their benefit payments are recovered.
Extended benefits for high unemployment:
States with high unemployment rates can offer a one-week extension of 7 weeks, which some PUA applicants started receiving in 2020. Applicants who started receiving Extended Benefits (EB) in 2020 can receive the balance of the 7 weeks in 2021, as long as the unemployment rate remains.
DETR initially announced that due to the high average unemployment rate in Nevada, the state will be able to provide an additional 7 weeks of extended benefits (EB) for claimants who have exhausted their claims. In the ordinary IU, DETR was able to immediately offer this benefit to eligible applicants.
Unfortunately, as the PUA program expired on December 26, 2020, the Department of Labor requires Nevada to wait 13 weeks before adding 7 weeks of extended benefits (EB) for PUA claimants who have exhausted their claims. This could create a two-week gap for many PUA recipients.
Status: To avoid this gap, DETR is finalizing emergency regulations that will allow the agency to apply the additional 7 weeks and issue payments without having to wait the 13 weeks imposed by federal authorities. The emergency regulations must be signed by the agency’s administration and the governor before being submitted to the legislature, which has 15 days to review them. The DETR is scheduled for these emergency regulations to be implemented one week before the 11-week discharge of CAA PUA benefits. PUA applicants will be able to receive the 7 weeks of EB without interruption of benefits.
LAW:
Status: Although I applied for additional funding from FEMA, I did not obtain enough LWA funding to pay for week 6. Any remaining funds will be used to pay for weeks 1-5 for people waiting for an award or appeal and qualifying for the benefit in those weeks. weeks. No action is required on the part of the applicants to receive this benefit.
All extensions:
It is important to note that these federal programs generally expire the week ending March 13, 2021, unless Congress extends them. And extensions will require additional computer programming. If you wait too late to expand your programs, you may experience another gap in the benefits.
Applicants may not realize that their benefits, even with these extensions, may be temporarily expired due to federal rules. E.g:
- A PUA plaintiff who started filing 2/2/20, allegedly received the maximum amount of PUA 2020 of 39 weeks on October 31, 2020 – exhausting his PUA application.
- Then they would have been eligible for extended benefits, and the 7 weeks would have ended on December 19, 2020 – exhausting their PUA + EB application.
- According to the CAA, the additional 11 weeks will exhaust the week ending March 13, 2021.
DETR encourages applicants to visit http://ui.nv.gov/css.html [ui.nv.gov] and detr.nv.gov/coronavirus [detr.nv.gov] to view important ads and access essential resources. Additional updates will be provided as the information becomes available.