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President Joe Biden and Democrats in Congress hope to spend an additional $ 1.9 trillion on the pandemic, including additional benefits for the unemployed.
However, many unemployed workers have not yet received benefit payments from the latest incentive package, which former President Trump signed more than a month ago.
States such as California, Colorado, Georgia, Hawaii, Indiana and Virginia have not provided assistance to groups of workers, according to their unemployment agencies.
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The $ 900 billion exemption measure, adopted at the end of December, extended unemployment benefits by 11 weeks and increased wages by $ 300 a week.
Many states have provided aid to staged workers as they adapt their systems to take into account different elements of legislation.
As a result, some groups waited longer than others.
“The complexity of some of the additional specifications is a challenge for the program and will be an increased burden, not only for us. [unemployment insurance] personally, but also to the applicants, “Mark Butler, Georgia’s labor commissioner, said in January.
Some of these updates are ongoing, the Georgia Department of Labor said in a tweet on Tuesday.
Biden’s plan would extend unemployment benefits until September and increase wages by $ 400 a week.
Exhausted unemployment benefits
Delays seem to be the most common for workers who have been collecting benefits since early spring and are “exhausting” their aid – which means they have reached the maximum number of weeks allowed under the CARES Act.
This federal law limited the duration of aid through two temporary programs: Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, which pays benefits to the self-employed and others who do not qualify for typical state assistance, and Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation, which provided additional weeks of benefits state long-term unemployed.
It seems that the resumption of their benefits took longer than for the other workers who have not yet reached their maximum weeks.
Colorado, for example, began providing aid to workers Monday – except for workers who have exhausted PUA and PEUC benefits.
The date for that “phase 2 launch” has not yet been set, according to a post on the Colorado Department of Labor website.
California, which reportedly ran out of benefits, is facing a similar situation, according to a spokesman for the Department of Employment Development, which did not provide a timeline for system updates.
Virginia and Hawaii began paying those who had exhausted PUA benefits, but not those who were left without PEUC benefits for the long-term unemployed.
Hawaii will soon begin paying for these benefits, said William Kuntsman, a spokesman for the Department of Labor and Industrial Relations. He did not provide a specific timeline.
Virginia officials originally planned to issue the payments on January 29. However, “the date of implementation has changed”, according to its website of the Employment Commission. A spokesman did not immediately return a request for comment.
The $ 900 billion pandemic aid package has created additional requirements for some workers to continue to receive aid. For example, recipients of PUAs must submit documents to prove that they are self-employed. (The time period differs for new applicants and collectors.)
Indiana officials will begin paying PUA benefits once these requirements are met. These “vouchers” have been made available to state workers since January 29, according to the Department for Labor Development.
“The additional requirements must be integrated before eligible payments can be released,” Butler said of Georgia.
These include increased identification verification requirements, a new mechanism for employers to report job refusals and failures to return to work by employees, and additional fraud detection measures, he said.