NJ Unemployment Insurance Monetary determination (2010, employment, calculator)

[Chubz]

Does NJ base your weeks of eligibility of the baseweeks you have worked in the base year or does it go off of you wages paid? Here is my situation, lets say I continue to laid off through July 18th 2010. I will have to cal in to reauthorize my claim. Going off of 2009's base year I can assume when i reauthorize they are going to back from April 1 2009 to march 31 2010. I will have 3.5 months worked in that time frame (I was laid off on July 17th 2009). Thats only about 14-15 weeks of work but I did gross well over 30k in that small time frame.

Does this mean I will only be able to get a new Claim of 15 weeks at the max WBR 584? Or since my wages are more than 40X my WBR does that entitle me to a 26 week claim?

also at that point I will have been seperated from my employer for about a year at that point. They were used on my current claim. Will they still use that employer? I mean I do have wages from them in that time frame they will use for a base year. Does Unemployment department go back 18 months or use the base year? I see they wrote they go back 18 months for quarters worked and then I see base years and alternative base years. If I use their calculator it says i only get 15 weeks at the max of 584. However if I work 26 weeks and grossed the same 32k, it is still 584. if you go 584X40 (40x my WBR) it gets me 23360. So as you can see i grossed about 55x my WBR.

[wannabee]

You have some good questions! I know there must be plenty of people on this forum who have re-opened their existing claim after the one-year mark. (Or some that got started on a new claim).

My questions to them are:

Was there a change in the amount of the WBR?
Was there a change in the amount of weeks available to claim and WHY?
Was there a change to "date of claim" (original date of UE claim)?
Were there any wages reported since the original DOC?
Was the income earned during the six months prior to the original DOC disproportionally high or low in comparison to the twelve months preceding it?

I've read posts from people in other states who say they've started on a brand new 26-week initial claim after the first benefit year expired, even with $0 earnings from the time of the original DOC. It could be a mistake, who knows? It seems strange to me because in New Jersey, the little blue unemployment booklet says:

(page 3)

Requalifying Requirement
If you received benefits on an unemployment insurance claim, you
must have worked since the beginning of that claim to qualify for
another unemployment insurance claim after the first claim’s benefit
year ends. You cannot go from one claim to another successive claim
without working in between. Two claims cannot be based on the
same separation from work.
You must earn six times the previous claim’s weekly benefit rate and
work at least four weeks in covered employment to be eligible for
benefits in a successive benefit year.

According to the above quote, two claims based on the same separation from work is not something they do in NJ. You have not worked since the beginning of your claim (DOC), correct?

My original DOC is 12/2007. It has not changed. During 12/2008 I was receiving Tier I benefits. I had no earnings since the DOC and my WBR has not changed since the DOC.

If (and that's a big IF) it's normal procedure for them to give you an alternative base period and recalculate your WBR, after your benefit year ends - it did not affect me. It could be because I was paid the exact same salary during the six months before my claim. If they did look at that, there would be no change in my WBR.

[ESHambone]

Chubz, I think you may be over-thinking about the 1 year anniversary matter. As soon as you are collecting for 52 weeks, they put a hold on your account, and you have to speak to a rep and he/she will reactivate your claim (you do not start a new claim) and you just resume collecting the same amount that you have been collecting. As a matter of fact, my 1 year anniversary will be next week and I don't look forward to calling a million times or being on hold forever to try to speak to a rep lol

[taurus430]

Originally Posted by ESHambone

Chubz, I think you may be over-thinking about the 1 year anniversary matter. As soon as you are collecting for 52 weeks, they put a hold on your account, and you have to speak to a rep and he/she will reactivate your claim (you do not start a new claim) and you just resume collecting the same amount that you have been collecting. As a matter of fact, my 1 year anniversary will be next week and I don't look forward to calling a million times or being on hold forever to try to speak to a rep lol

ESHambone is correct. Nothing changes with your initial claim at 1 year, you just have it re-activated, that's it. I did mine last April, called 7:10am, was on hold about 30mins, and certified with the Rep. Done.

You're good till the 2 year mark.......LOL

[wannabee]

Originally Posted by taurus430

ESHambone is correct. Nothing changes with your initial claim at 1 year, you just have it re-activated, that's it. I did mine last April, called 7:10am, was on hold about 30mins, and certified with the Rep. Done.

You're good till the 2 year mark.......LOL

Question....what do we do at the two-year mark?
Re re-open? What do you think?

[ESHambone]

wannabee, I think you might be getting a bit ahead of yourself lol since right now the most anyone can collect is 99 weeks (5 weeks short of 2 years), but who knows, there might very well be (tho probably not too likely) yet another extension in the future to push it past the 2 year mark. I guess we will cross that bridge when/if we come to it.....

[taurus430]

Originally Posted by wannabee

Question....what do we do at the two-year mark?
Re re-open? What do you think?

I don't know, but my last claim (Tier IV) if we get it, is 3 days before my 2 yr mark. I doubt there will be a fifth extension, but you never know.

[ESHambone]

taurus430, when did you finish your EB? I assume you might have gone a month or more without any unemployment while waiting for Tier 3?

[taurus430]

Originally Posted by ESHambone

taurus430, when did you finish your EB? I assume you might have gone a month or more without any unemployment while waiting for Tier 3?

I finished EB mid Oct. Claimed Tier III on Nov 25th.

[ESHambone]

I see taurus430, so that begs the question would the 2 year mark be when you have actually collected the 104 weeks of unemployment regardless if you have gone past the 2 year mark of your original claim, or would the 2 year mark be considered whenever you hit the 2 year mark of your original claim even if you have not yet collected the 104 weeks because you might have waited a month or two without collecting any benefits to go from EB to Tier 3? I hope this is not confusing lol...Anyone know?