How do I know how much unemployment will pay - NYS Department of Labor benefit calculation?
I just filed my initial claim with NYS Department of Labor last week but I have no idea what my weekly benefit amount is going to be. The confirmation I got didn't show any dollar amounts, just that my claim was received. I worked part-time at two different jobs over the past year - one retail making $15/hour and another cleaning office buildings for $18/hour. My hours varied a lot between both jobs. Does anyone know how they calculate what you get? I need to know if it'll even cover my rent while I'm looking for full-time work.
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Sebastián Stevens
Your weekly benefit amount is calculated based on your highest earning quarter from the base period (usually the first 4 of the last 5 completed quarters before you filed). NYS Department of Labor takes that quarter's wages and divides by 26 to get your weekly amount, but it can't exceed the state maximum. With multiple part-time jobs, they'll use the combined wages from both employers in each quarter. You should receive a monetary determination letter within 1-2 weeks showing your exact benefit amount and the wage history they used to calculate it.
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Angelina Farar
•That's helpful! Do you know what the maximum weekly amount is right now? And will I get back pay for this week since I already filed?
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Bethany Groves
Check your online account on my.ny.gov - sometimes the benefit amount shows up there before you get the letter in the mail. When you log in and go to your unemployment claim, look for a section that says monetary determination or benefit calculation. It might already be updated with your weekly amount.
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KingKongZilla
•Mine took forever to show up online but when it did it had all the details about which quarters they used and everything
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Rebecca Johnston
honestly the whole system is so confusing like why cant they just tell you upfront when you file??? I had to wait 3 weeks to find out my amount and it was way less than I expected because they didnt count one of my jobs for some reason
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Sebastián Stevens
•Sometimes employers don't report wages correctly or on time to NYS Department of Labor. If you think they missed wages from one of your jobs, you can dispute it by providing pay stubs or W-2s as proof.
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Nathan Dell
I had trouble getting through to NYS Department of Labor when I needed to check on my benefit calculation. Kept getting busy signals and their online chat was useless. Finally found this service called Claimyr at claimyr.com that actually got me through to an agent who could explain my monetary determination. They have a demo video at https://youtu.be/qyftW-mnTNI showing how it works. Worth checking out if you can't get answers through the normal channels.
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Maya Jackson
•Never heard of that before but might be useful since I've been trying to call for days about my own benefit amount issues
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Tristan Carpenter
Same situation here with multiple part time jobs! Mine came out to about 40% of what I was making combined from both jobs. Better than nothing but definitely not enough to live on comfortably.
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