Are selfemployed who tried to file their claims under pua. In fact, state senator scott weiner from San Francisco says his Office Reached out. Is it fully fixed . What happened . I think whats happened is because of the Unprecedented Demand were seeing, sometimes the system can be a little intermittent. So it depends on how much load is coming in at one given time. Luckily our ui Online System has been a true work horse for us through this whole pandemic. Thats the only reason weve been able to process large volumes of claims automatically through that system and try to keep up with the workload. There are better times to try to get into the Online System. Thats usually between the hours in the morning up until, say, 10 00 a. M. And in the evening, after 5 00. Those are usually the best times to be able to get in and minimize the load that may be coming in at any oneg those prime hours you are less likely to encounter glitches and be cut off. Right. Sometimes what happens is the connections with some of the other parts of the system that might get a little hesitant and that could cause some intermittent problems, all depending on the load at any one given time. If you encounter that, come back in a little later. Your best times will be in the mornings and then in the evenings after 5 00. Arent there infrastructure system upgrades you could make to eliminate those problems . We have a system, were asking a lot more of it than usual. Not just because of the regular uninsurance program. Were used to high demand, although nothing like what weve seen in this avalanche during the pandemic. Were asking it to do a lot more, essentially building the airplane in mid air. Weve had to build in three brand new provisions with the federal c. A. R. E. S. Act, the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance Program is an entirely new program with all different kinds of eligibility requirements, start dates, et cetera. We have the new federal 600 stimulus payments and the 13week extension starting next week. Were putting a lot into that system. It drains it to make it hesitant at some points, especially during peak hours. I want to address some of the nittygritty. Eligibility and certification requirements. I think a lot of people are confused by that as to whether those have changed. If so, how are they different now. They have not changed. There was a period of time for a few weeks to try to lighten the load on our system by which certifications were being done on an automated fashion. That is done. In essence, the way that both systems work, thats regular unemployment and the pandemi unemployment assistance program, is after you get a claim initiated, every two weeks you must do whats called certifying. That means on an ongoing basis, you have to tell us, answering some basic questions that, yes, you remain unemployed and otherwise meet all eligibility requiremen requirements. In other words, you need to do that by you can get your biweekly benefit payment. How worried are you about people who have gotten overpaid . Is that something youre encountering a lot . I think its a small subset of folks because there was only a short amount of time we were doing auto certifying. We have set up a mechanism where people can tell us, hey, im back to work, i dont need to collect Unemployment Benefits anymore. We have directions for that on the website. In addition, youre trying to set up a whole other section of the system where people can connect with us and we can collect overpayments. The viewer questions are coming in so fast, i can barely read one before it jumps to the next one. A lot of questions about just who is eligible for pua. Well, first of all, you have to have lost your job or had hours reduced through no fault of your own as a direct result of the pandemic. It only has been in place now since february 2nd. So what it is is for those who are selfemployed, independent contractors, business owners, those who arent usually eligible for regular Unemployment Insurance including those who have a minimal work history with an employer. What happens is you go in through the same portable, the same Online System, but weve added additional questions on there. We can collect the information we need to determine if whether or not we have to process your claim as a regular Unemployment Insurance claim or we have to process it as a pandemic unemployment assistance claim. Now, on the application, will it ask them are you willing to work . Lets say youre a hair dresser. You cannot say yes to that because you are not supposed to be working yet. If you answer no, im not willing to work, does that mean youre cut off right there . You have to be able and available to work in order to collect Unemployment Benefits, whether that be Unemployment Insurance or pua assistance benefits. However, we have temporarily been able to adjust that normal eligibility requirement of looking for work since obviously in a stayathome situation theres not a whole lot of work available. So answer the questions truthfully. On the back end, just know if youre not looking for work at the from collecting Unemployment Benefits. Its been over 30 days, iiv. How long does it take for the id verification . Its a very good question. Whats happening is, for most people we can go and get claims processed in about three weeks. These are pretty clean cut. The ones well take longer to process are those in which the wage information received doesnt match our wage records or we cannot verify the individuals identity when the first case when we first get their information in. So for those situations, we do have to follow up and get Additional Information from a claimant to help prove they are who they say they are. That helps protect the integrity of the system because hackers who might go in with imposter fraud wont follow up with that. Typically it only takes maybe an additional week or two. Maybe its taking longer right now because of the avalanche that came in of the claim load which funnels through all the buckets of claims were working with. We are doing a number of things, redirecting hundreds of staff to those identity alert issues and also looking at automation by how we can further automate that to make it easier to process. All right. Drawn griffin wants to know, i have yet to receive any money even though i certified four weeks. So is that normal . And how about the 600 . You cant get the federal extra 600 payment unless youre collecting at least 1. 00 in a regular pandemic or unemployment assistance. Thats the requirement. We will automatically add the 600 to that payment. Karen wants to know if you are fired, can you still collect if you were collecting before you were fired. It depends. There are what we call good cause provisions in the Unemployment Insurance program, in other words, that you have good cause for either refusing wok or leaving work. Theres certain requirements about that. So on your certification, what you do every two weeks to tell us youre eligible, mark on that that, yes, i have refused work. What happens is we have to follow up with you. Its a casebycase basis to determine whether or not your reasons match good cause for refusing that work. Okay. Here is a question. Im essential. I have no child care due to the school shutdown. Can i stop work and get help from you guys . Again, thats one of those casebycase basis. What you do is go ahead if you havent already applied, do so and we can collect some information to help us determine whether or not you meet the eligibility requirements of you cant work through no fault of your own, for example. I would encourage you to either apply for the benefits, or if youve already done so, make sure you note that on your certification form. One last question before we take a short break. Kimberly english wants to know, can i get the 600 extra of the federal money even if i go back part time . Again, if you are collecting at least 1. 00 in a regular Unemployment Insurance payment and that minimum is 167 on the pua payment, you will be given that extra 600 benefit payment when you get your biweekly payments. Well take a short break right now on air. You can get extra content if you go to our Live Streaming all right. We are back with loree levy from the edd. Shannon wants to know what if benefits prior to covid are set to expire in two weeks. What are the next steps for me . I dont have the particulars of this persons claim. However, if youre still within your existing benefit year and youre about ready to run out of your benefits and still have not been able to obviously return to work through no fault of your own, youre likely a candidate for a federal extension. Thats the new 13week extension that were launching next week in phases. The most recent folks who have been running out of benefits, theyll be most likely the first ones well be able to get an extension processed for. Well do that automatically for you once we see youve ended up to 26 weeks of benefits. You get a notice, something in your ui online account and youre granted the ability to certify if youre eligible for that next payment. Were getting a question from twitter. What happens after you run out of the 13week puec extension . By the time i get it, its going to be backpay toward bills. Do i goat switched to pua . It all kind of depends. Its a casebycase basis. I will tell you that in the last recession there ended up being a total of four or five different extensions of benefits available. Each one carrying different weeks of benefits associated with it. Different eligibility with each one. I wouldnt be surprised if we see a little more coming up as well as we proceed. I want to explore this is my question. What about taxes . Theres normally an option to have federal taxes taken out before the payment is receive. But now people are getting the full amount without taxes taken out. Does that mean people will owe a bunch of money on their taxes when they file next year . Its possible youll want to set aside some money. It is one of those things we highly recommend that people do plan for. Okay. Will the extension be backdated . It starts next week, from james carr. It depends on when you ran out of your regular benefits. The earliest we can pay an extension claim is for the week that started march 29th. If indeed you ran out of your benefits, youre still within your 12month benefit year, but you ran out of benefits sometime in january, we cant pay you any extension benefits between the january time frame and the start of the extension period. It depends on when you run out of those up to 26 weeks of benefits in the regular ui program. Jose has a question which reflects a lot of peoples frustration as well. He says how long does it take from pending to paid . A lot of people feel like theyre waiting and waiting. His status says pending for over four weeks. Weve processed 5. 1 million claims for benefits and paid more than 16 billion in benefits. What that shows you is really the vast majority of people, if they come in use ui online. Thats highly suggested because we can automate processing through the urktsi Online System much faster than via phone. We can get it done usually in about three weeks before you receive that first benefit payment. When you get your edd debit card, from that point on you get into a biweekly certification period. Each of those biweekly payment periods, you can get that benefit payment usually within a couple ofdays. Peuc questions. It want to know if we were put on pua first, will those weeks being subtracted from puec and also when someones claim year ends. I think what youre talking about is all the confusion thats been so difficult for so many people out there right now. Normally, the regular Unemployment Insurance program is confusing on its own. You have a lot of new people. Now we have a lot of new provisions weve had to put in place with the federal c. A. R. E. S. Act. All these have different start dates, eligibility requirements. Were doing our best to get information up on our website on a daily basis to help people keep informed on things just like that. The unfortunate thing is it all kind of depends on when you run out of your benefits and what kind of dates your claim falls within, whether or not you get into a pua claim and get transferred to an extension claim later. Georgeanne has a question that says no option on her account to apply for pua online. Why cant i manage my claim online like im told by edd . Only received 13 weeks of ui which ended already. Will i get more money soon . Applying for pua online seems to be challenging for her, too. I think, again, that goes back to the confusion. We have one ui Online System. Its because we need to collect all the same information whether or not youre applying for regular Unemployment Insurance program or a pua claim. Depending on the information you give us, youre presented additional questions that we programmed in, and that helps us understand whether we have to process your claim as a regular claim or pua claim. There really is no separate system. Its all in the same system and remains available for individuals. Loree. Thanks so much. Well take a short break on air. We are back with loree levy from californias edd to answer your questions about benefits. My husband is a seasonal firefighter and got rehired and cant seem to find a way to stop his benefits. Normally you wouldnt approve the funds, but the state is pushing them through. He has all this extra money sitting there. Basically thats a situation i think ive seen a lot of. What do you advise people there . It actually is a very small subset of individuals. What i would advise is go through our ask edd system. Theres a segment where you can say i have returned to work. That helps us process the fact that youre back to work and well be following up to collect that money back. Again, it was just for a few weeks when we were doing some auto certifying. Do you call people individually, loree . It all depends. Youll receive a notice. Normally youll receive a notice either by mail or in your online account, well be calling you and well establish a time period to call. David wants to know can i apply for Unemployment Benefits extension even though i exhausted my account prior to the pandemic . Again, without seeing the specifics of the case, it may be a situation by which somebody ran out of benefits. If theyre still within that 12month benefit year, in other words, your claim year started on or after june 2nd of 2019, but you ran out of your benefits back in december or january, we cant pay any extension benefits for that time all the way up until the first week we can pay extension benefits which is the week that starts march 29th. Here is a question from i cant even read them because loree, theyre coming in so quickly. Why isnt id verification Available Online instead of sending it through the mail, nick wants to know. The process is complicated and shouldnt take this long. We so apologize for that. Normally we wouldnt have this kind of workload associated with that, and we have so many new people coming in to apply now. It is a system that were looking at trying to automate. Were doing a number of Different Things in addition to redirecting hundreds of staff. While we dont have it currently available to be able to upload it, for example, hopefully we can do that so time soon. Minder has a good question. Maybe you have an answer. Pua, they filled out the application, made a minor mistake on it so that caused disqualification. How to fix. Called thousands of times. No resolution. What do you say to that . There are ways in which you can get if there was an error made on your application and the unfortunate thing is, if you do make an error, it cant be automatically processed through the system so it kicks it out for staff followup which will always take longer to get processed unfortunately. However, if you cant get through on the phone or cant submit a question into your online account, you can take the notice you received that tells you what we have noted that you supplied to us, and you can correct it on that notice and you can send it back to the edd at the address that is listed on that notice. Were finding a lot of people sending just to any address they can. Its important to send it back to the address on that notice. Jennifer wants to know, please address when penalty weeks have been served, do we go back to our regular ui . Again, i dont have the specifics of her claim to be able to answer. There are some penalty weeks involved. Normally associated with the false statement made in the prior claim. Those are things we normally work through with the claimant on a casebycase basis. All right. A lot of people are also asking about retroactive payments and when those will be issued. You addressed that a little bit and i know the situations are different. Do you feel like you guys are getting a good handle on that . I think the demand has just been such an onslaught that, again, were redirecting hundreds of staff and doing all kinds of things to assist with that including the hiring effort of 1,800 people. I think the hardest part is we continue to have to build something new, this plane in mid air situation. Im hoping when we launch the Extension Program next week and the phase two of that program in july, we can start getting some of these new type of elements we have to build settled and hopefully that makes things a lot smoother for individuals as we move forward. All right, loree, we have only 20 seconds left. Not enough time to launch another question. Again, what is the best time to try to use the website or call your hotline . There are the phone lines are available 8 00 a. M. To 8 00 p. M. Seven days a ek woo. Then, of course, with our Online System, i would encourage you to address that and try to get into that. Before the hours of 10 00 in the morning and after the hours of 5 00 in the evening. Loree levy from edd, thank you so much for answering our questions about Unemployment Benefits, pua, a whole bunch of questions. I know its a challenging task. Thank you for keeping the conversation going with us. Thank you very much for having me. All right. Stick were working every day to tell stories to build a better bay area. May is Mental Health awareness months. Right now during the pandemic its a topic that in manyay affects everybody. In an interview only on abc 7, reporter kate larsen spoke to zach williams, Robin Williams son, about how he has over come his own Mental Health challenges and working to help others. Kristen, i had a great conversation with zach this week who grew up in San Francisco. He now lives in los angeles with his family including his 1yearold son. He actually has his birthday this week. Zach is a dedicated Mental Health professional. We had a really great conversation about his work and how hes used his work to help cope with his own Mental Health struggles. My becoming a Mental Health professional came from the trauma and loss after moye dad died by suicide. I experienced a serious low point in my life. I fell into becoming a Mental Health advocate because i needed to heal and recover myself. We need to come out of this coronavirus pandemic with a growthoriented mindset around supporting others in our communities to create a more connected, happier world. So for himself, zach told me that talk therapy, Community Support groups, meditation and staying away from drugs and alcohol have really helped him deal with his own feelings of anxiety and depression head on. Zach is an en siinsightful guy. Hes starting his own anxiety supplement company. We have the complete interview on our website, abc7news. Com. You can check it out there. Of course, kristen, coming up at 4 00, we have our town hall meeting coming up. I hope conversations like this will continue to help erase the sigma surrounding Mental Health issues. Absolutely. It was a great conversation. We look forward to more at 4 00 in half an hour. Looking forward to that as well. That will do it for now. Thank you for joining us on this interactive show getting answers. To dae we got answers regarding californias Unemployment Benefits. Well be here every weekday at 3 00 on air and live stream answering your questions which you can easily post onto facebook. Watch it on facebook live, youtube live, abc7news. Com and the abc 7 news app. Were tracking questions that werent answered. Tonight, as america reopens, what the head of the cdc said about a possible second wave hitting the u. S. It made news. And then, the president late today and what he said about any second wave. Saying the country will not close and what he added. Tonight, several states reporting cases on the rise now, as we reopen. In alabama, for example, where cases jumped by more than 600 cases, images tonight of a high school graduation. Masks to get in. But not everyone choosing to wear one. Tonight, the warning from dr. Anthony fauci, saying, quote, now is not the time to tempt fate. The head of the cdc warning a second wave is likely coming and that a second lockdown cannot be ruled out. The president with a very different message just a short time ago and youll hear it. And the new study tonight raising questions about late action taken by the