How far back can unemployment audit your claim? California EDD question

The part about reporting what you earned each week versus when it deposited is exactly what I was doing wrong I think. So that's the rule? You report wages in the week the work happened not when you got paid?

Yeah that's the correct way to do it. Wages go on the certification for the week you actually did the work and earned the money, not the week the client paid you. If you freelance and a client pays 3 weeks late, that money still counts for the week you completed the work. The Report Wages tool in UI Online can help you sort out a week before you certify, but it can't fix weeks you already submitted.

That's genuinely stressful to hear because I definitely reported some payments the week they hit my account. I should contact EDD to correct those weeks I think.

wait so they can look at stuff from before you even filed?? like your whole work history??

Not exactly. The audit is about whether you certified correctly during your claim, so the focus is on the weeks you actually collected benefits. But the wage records from your base period are part of your file and they use them to verify things. It's really about the certification period more than anything pre-filing.

This is what I understood too. The audit window for how you certified is essentially your whole active claim, not just the last few weeks. So if someone filed 8 months ago they could potentially look at all 8 months of certifications.

How did you know if yours was fraud or not? That's the part that terrifies me, the difference between an honest reporting mistake and something EDD decides was fraud.

My overpayment letter said non-fraud right on it. EDD's determination is about whether you intentionally gave wrong info or hid something versus made a genuine mistake. I appealed mine because I genuinely thought I was reporting correctly and I gathered all my records showing what I earned each week. Keep everything, every invoice, every payment record.

The appeal window is 30 days from the mailing date on the Notice of Overpayment. Miss that and you're in a much harder spot. I'd also look into the waiver option, the form is DE 1446UI, which you can ask for if the overpayment wasn't your fault and paying it back would be a real financial hardship.

Usually something triggers it, like a mismatch between what you reported and what an employer or client submitted in wage records. Random audits do happen but most overpayment situations start because there's a discrepancy EDD's system flagged.

ok that makes me feel slightly better. I guess as long as I'm reporting accurately and in the right week there's not much to worry about.

Exactly, and if you're ever unsure about a specific week use the Report Wages section in UI Online to work it out before you certify. It won't fix past certifications but at least going forward you'll have it right.

14 weeks back, that's brutal. Did they end up having to pay it all?

they appealed and got some of it reduced but yeah most of it stood. the lesson was keep records of everything even when you think the claim is going smoothly

Record keeping really is the thing. Every invoice, every payment, every work log noting which week you did the work. If EDD ever questions a week you need to be able to show your math.

oh I definitely thought those were the same thing. so if EDD audits you and finds an overpayment you can then appeal that decision?

Yes exactly. EDD makes a decision on the overpayment and mails you a notice. You then have 30 days from the mailing date to appeal using the DE 1000M form or a written letter sent to the address on the notice. The appeal goes to the California Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board and an administrative law judge handles it.

and keep certifying while your appeal is going. EDD can only pay back weeks that were actually certified, so if you stop certifying thinking the appeal pauses everything you lose those weeks.

How did you handle it in the end? Did you end up with any underpayments or issues?

I ended up reporting each payment in the week I actually did the work, not when I was paid. For fixed-price project work that meant reporting it in the week I delivered the work. For hourly stuff it was easier because I had time logs. No overpayment notice so far, knock on wood.

Hourly freelance with time logs is clean and straightforward for this. Fixed project billing is the messy one because there's often no clean 'week the work happened' especially if a project spans multiple weeks. Reasonable to prorate it across the weeks you actually worked on it.

wait I had no idea there was a formula like that. I thought you just subtracted the whole amount you earned from your weekly benefit. so if I earned $80 and my WBA is like $280 I wouldn't have anything reduced?

The formula is: first 25% of your WBA or $25, whichever is MORE, is not counted against you. So on a $280 WBA your earnings buffer is $70 (25 percent of $280). If you earned $80 that week, only $10 would be subtracted from your payment. You'd get $270 instead of $280. If you earned $60 that week, nothing gets subtracted since $60 is under your $70 buffer.

This is the first time I've seen that explained clearly. I might have actually been underpaying myself without knowing it.

The EDD site has a benefits calculator but it's for estimating your weekly benefit amount before you file. For the earnings offset math while you're claiming, the formula above is right. It's one of those things EDD really should make more visible.

That's what I'm worried about. Like maybe I've been fine and no one has noticed, or maybe a letter is coming three months from now.

The honest move is to contact EDD now and let them know you think some weeks may have been reported in the wrong period. It's always better to bring it up yourself than to wait for them to find it. Use the message option through your UI Online account.

For non-fraud overpayments tied to your actual benefit claim, EDD is looking at the weeks you certified during your benefit year. Benefit years are 52 weeks long. For fraud cases involving intentional misrepresentation EDD has much longer authority to investigate and recover, but that's a completely different situation from someone who reported wages in the wrong week by mistake.

ok so for a regular honest mistake it's basically just the weeks you were on the claim, not years and years back

Right, the audit of your certifications stays within your claim period. The 'years back' thing your cousin mentioned is more relevant to fraud investigations which involve a whole different process including potential false statement disqualifications and penalties.

I made this exact mistake too. I saw 'pending' in my Claim History and assumed someone was auditing me when really there was just an open question about my separation from my last job.

The pending status in Claim History just means EDD is working something out before they can release a payment. Could be adjudication, could be identity verification, could be they need to match up wage records. It doesn't automatically mean audit or overpayment.

The Notice of Determination is what EDD sends when they've actually made a decision on an eligibility question. If you haven't gotten one of those you're probably still in the waiting period for whatever issue they're resolving.

Did the agent give you any sense of whether you should appeal or request the waiver or both?

She said EDD would mail the determination and I should read it carefully and decide within 30 days whether to appeal. She didn't tell me whether I'd win or what to do, just that both options were on the table if I disagreed. I ended up filing an appeal with the DE 1000M and also submitting the DE 1446UI waiver request because I genuinely didn't misreport intentionally.

Filing both the appeal and the waiver request at the same time is smart. They're parallel processes and one doesn't block the other. If the appeal resolves it you can withdraw the waiver, and vice versa.

The CalJOBS requirement specifically is about keeping your benefits going forward, not really the same as a certification audit. But yes, missing the registration can stop payments and you'd need to get that sorted with EDD.

I ended up getting it resolved but it meant a week of pending status while EDD sorted out whether I'd complied. CalJOBS is at caljobs.ca.gov and you have to actually post a resume there, not just create an account.

I did my CalJOBS registration the same week I got that DE 8405 and I still got a pending week that cleared after a few days. I think there's just some lag between when their system confirms you registered.

This is exactly the headspace I've been in since I got that letter last week. Even if everything turns out fine the anxiety in the meantime is real.

the only thing that helped me was keeping a simple spreadsheet with every week, what I earned, when I earned it, what I reported and what I actually got paid. made me feel like I had a handle on it even when I was nervous

A personal record like that is genuinely useful if EDD ever questions a week. Even if EDD doesn't require you to submit it proactively having it means you can reconstruct exactly what happened for any week they ask about.

So basically if my freelance clients filed any kind of business paperwork with the state that shows what they paid me, that could get matched against what I reported?

Potentially, yes. Businesses that pay contractors often file wage records. If those records show different amounts or different weeks than what you reported to EDD, the system can flag it. That's why reporting accurately in the week you did the work, not when you got paid, matters so much.

The same matching process applies to regular W-2 employment. Your former employer's wage records are part of what EDD used to calculate your weekly benefit amount in the first place, so they already have that baseline to compare against.

Wednesday mornings are the tip I've seen the most. I tried Monday morning and was on hold forever before getting disconnected. Haven't had the nerve to try again.

Tuesday and Wednesday early are what worked for me. Monday mornings are brutal apparently because of the weekend backlog. Fridays before noon worked once too but I think that might have been luck.

Claimyr handled the hold situation for me when I needed to ask about a specific week that was pending. I ended up talking to an agent who confirmed what was actually in my file for that week. Saved me a morning of redialing.

Has anyone actually done this and can say what happened? I'm considering doing exactly this for maybe three or four weeks where I think I reported the payment date instead of the work date.

I did it for two weeks. I sent a message through UI Online explaining that I'd reported wages in the week I received payment instead of the week I completed the work, included the invoice dates, and asked EDD to review. Got a response about ten days later and ended up with a small adjusted payment rather than a formal overpayment notice.

Proactive contact like that matters. A formal overpayment notice comes with an overpayment determination on record and the whole appeal clock starts ticking. Getting it resolved quietly before that happens is a better outcome if EDD is willing to handle it that way.

The message option in UI Online is underused for this kind of thing. A lot of people only think of it for checking status but it's the right channel for flagging that you think something was reported incorrectly on a past week.

EDD determines whether you need to register in CalJOBS based on your claim type and situation. If they say you're exempt you're exempt. Asking about it doesn't flag your claim for auditing, those are completely separate systems.

ok that's reassuring. I got a letter saying I did need to register and I did it, but then someone told me I could have asked to be waived out of it and I wasn't sure if asking would have created problems.

CalJOBS registration and benefit payment audits work off different parts of your file. The work search and registration stuff is about ongoing eligibility. The certification accuracy stuff is about whether you reported earnings correctly. Asking questions about either one doesn't automatically create a problem in the other.

EDD requires that you're able and available for work and actively looking as a condition of getting benefits each week. When you certify you're confirming that. EDD doesn't publish a specific number of contacts you have to make each week.

so there's no magic number like five applications per week that I need to hit? I've been stressing about that for no reason apparently

No specific number is listed in EDD's rules. The requirement is that you're genuinely looking for work. Keeping your own record of where you applied is a good personal habit, but EDD's rules don't name a minimum count or say UI Online has a tracker for it.

I kept a spreadsheet for myself just to have it in case EDD ever asked but I've never had anyone from EDD actually ask me to produce a list of applications.