NYS Department of Labor - when do unemployment benefits stop automatically?

In New York, regular unemployment benefits stop when you reach either 26 weeks of benefits OR when you exhaust your total benefit amount, whichever comes first. Your benefit year lasts 52 weeks from when you first filed, but you can only collect for a maximum of 26 weeks during that year. You should be able to see your remaining balance and weeks in your my.ny.gov account.

yeah mine just stopped after 26 weeks, no warning or anything. one week i filed my weekly claim and the next week there was nothing to file. make sure you keep looking for work though because they can audit your job search log even after benefits end

The NYS Department of Labor will send you a notice when you're getting close to exhausting benefits, usually when you have about 2-3 weeks left. But don't rely on that - keep track yourself. If you're still unemployed when regular benefits end, you might be eligible for extended benefits during periods of high unemployment, but that's pretty rare and depends on state unemployment rates.

I had such a hard time getting through to NYS Department of Labor when my benefits were about to end because I had questions about extending them. Spent hours on hold just to get disconnected. Finally used this service called Claimyr (claimyr.com) that helped me get through to an actual agent. They have a video demo at https://youtu.be/qyftW-mnTNI showing how it works. Made the whole process so much easier than trying to call myself.

ugh the whole system is so confusing! why can't they just make it simple and tell you exactly when benefits end instead of making us figure it out ourselves. i'm always paranoid im going to mess something up and lose money

Just keep filing your weekly claims until the system won't let you anymore. That's what I did and it worked out fine. You'll know when you're done because there won't be a weekly claim to file.

Just went through this myself! My benefits ended exactly at 26 weeks even though I still had some money left in my account. The key thing is that NY uses whichever limit you hit first - either 26 weeks OR your total benefit amount. I'd recommend logging into your NY.gov account weekly to check both your remaining weeks and dollar amount so you're not caught off guard. Also, make sure you keep detailed records of your job search activities because as others mentioned, they can audit that even after benefits end. The uncertainty is stressful but at least you can track it yourself online.