NYS Department of Labor employer not responding to unemployment claim - what happens next?

In New York, employers typically have 10 business days to respond to the NYS Department of Labor about your unemployment claim. If they don't respond within that timeframe, your claim will generally be approved by default. The employer loses their right to contest the claim if they miss the deadline. Since you mentioned you were laid off due to business reasons, that should qualify you for benefits anyway.

same thing happened to me last year, employer never responded and my claim got approved automatically after like 2 weeks. you should be fine especially since you were laid off not fired for cause

I had a situation where my employer was really slow to respond but they did eventually submit something on day 12. Even though they were late, NYS Department of Labor still processed their response and it delayed my claim by another week while they reviewed everything. But since yours is a layoff situation, even if they respond late it shouldn't matter - layoffs due to lack of work are qualifying separations.

If you're having trouble getting through to check on your claim status, I used a service called Claimyr recently that helped me reach an actual NYS Department of Labor agent. You can check them out at claimyr.com - they have a video demo at https://youtu.be/qyftW-mnTNI that shows how it works. It was super helpful when I needed to get clarification about my adjudication process.

The whole system is so slow and frustrating!! My employer took forever too and then when they finally responded they tried to claim I quit when I was clearly laid off. Had to fight it for weeks. Hope yours goes smoother since restaurants are pretty straightforward about layoffs usually.

Just wanted to say hang in there! The waiting is the worst part but once it gets approved the backpay should cover from when you first filed. Make sure you keep filing your weekly claims even while it's pending.

I went through this exact same situation a few months ago with my claim. The 10 business day rule is generally accurate, but I'd recommend calling the Department of Labor if you can get through after day 10 just to confirm your claim status. In my case, it took about 12 business days for the system to automatically update and show approved, even though my employer never responded. The restaurant industry layoffs are usually pretty cut and dry since there's clear documentation of reduced hours/business. Keep doing those weekly certifications like you mentioned - that's super important to get your full backpay once it's approved!