How many hours can you work for unemployment benefits in NY?
I'm getting conflicting information about work hour limits while collecting unemployment. My cousin says you can work up to 30 hours, but someone at my temp agency said it's only 3 days per week maximum. I don't want to mess up my benefits but I really need some extra income. Does anyone know the actual NYS Department of Labor rules for how many hours you can work while still getting UI? I've been looking through the my.ny.gov site but it's confusing.
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Mateo Hernandez
The rule isn't about specific hours or days - it's about earnings. You can work any amount of hours as long as you don't earn more than your weekly benefit rate. If you do earn more than your weekly benefit amount, you won't get any unemployment for that week. If you earn less than your weekly benefit rate, they'll reduce your UI payment by the amount you earned. You have to report ALL work and earnings when you file your weekly claim.
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NebulaNova
•Oh wow that makes more sense! So if my weekly benefit is $400 and I earn $300 from part-time work, I'd get $100 in unemployment that week?
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Aisha Khan
Be super careful about the reporting requirements. NYS Department of Labor requires you to report work for ANY day you work, even if it's just a few hours. And you have to report it the week you do the work, not when you get paid. I learned this the hard way when I got an overpayment notice because I was reporting my earnings the week I received payment instead of the week I actually worked.
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Ethan Taylor
•This is so important! I almost got in trouble for the same thing. The weekly certification asks specifically about the days you worked, not when you got your paycheck.
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Yuki Ito
ugh the NYS Department of Labor phone system is impossible when you need to ask these questions. I've been trying to get through for weeks to clarify my work reporting situation and keep getting hung up on after waiting forever. Has anyone found a way to actually talk to someone there?
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Carmen Lopez
•I had the same problem until someone told me about Claimyr - it's a service that helps you get through to NYS Department of Labor agents. I used it last month when I needed to resolve an adjudication issue and actually got connected to someone within an hour. Check out claimyr.com, they have a video demo at https://youtu.be/qyftW-mnTNI that shows how it works. Worth it if you really need to talk to someone.
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AstroAdventurer
Also remember you still have to be able and available for full-time work even if you're doing part-time jobs. If you turn down suitable full-time work because of your part-time schedule, that could cause problems with your claim.
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Andre Dupont
Wait I thought there was a rule about not working more than 4 days? My friend said that but maybe she was wrong?
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Mateo Hernandez
•No, there's no specific day limit. It's all about the earnings vs your weekly benefit rate. Your friend might be thinking of old rules or different state rules.
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Oliver Cheng
Just to add to what others have said - you can find the official earnings rules in the NYS Department of Labor handbook section 590. It clearly states that you can work while collecting UI as long as your total earnings don't exceed your weekly benefit rate. There's also no limit on the number of days you can work per week, just the earnings threshold. I keep a copy of the relevant pages saved on my phone because I do gig work and need to reference it often when calculating my weekly claims.
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