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I will eligible to claim UI in NJ in about two weeks. Currently, benefits last 26 weeks in NJ, subject to possible increase depending on Congress's actions.
If claiming on the web, UI recipients must claim once a week using the internet. Clearly, if one is out of state, the NJ dept of labor will be able to tell by the IP address.
I checked the rules, and searched online, and could not find any rule prohibiting claiming benefits while in the U.S. but outside of New Jersey.
I am hoping to be able to travel for more than a few days at a time, without breaking any rules upon getting online and entering my weekly claim. Moreover, my profession is practiced nationwide, and I can look for a job using my laptop just as easily in Arizona as in NJ.
Sounds like what you want to do is to keep the money flowing while you're on vacation. You are not supposed to do that. Unemployment benefits are paid while you are unemployed searching for work - not traveling for pleasure.
Yes, you can claim from anywhere in the US but, as a general rule, people have moved and are claiming from their new IP - and also do not claim while traveling the country unless actually doing interviews.
If you are consistently claiming outside of NJ from varying IPs, without having informed NJ of a change of address, sooner or later, NJ may ask you to explain why your claims are submitted from various parts of the country.
Keep very good logs of any job searches done during this period. NJ may still claim you were not Able and Available to take a position because of this travel and request repayment of benefits paid when claimed outside of NJ.
Besides the searching for work, you have to be able to accept work immediately. On the off chance, you get a call from an application you submitted for NJ while you're in AZ, you need to head home immediately, even if that means buying a full-fare, short-notice ticket, and forfeiting any value for your nonrefundable return ticket.
Sounds like what you want to do is to keep the money flowing while you're on vacation. You are not supposed to do that. Unemployment benefits are paid while you are unemployed searching for work - not traveling for pleasure.
Yes, you can claim from anywhere in the US but, as a general rule, people have moved and are claiming from their new IP - and also do not claim while traveling the country unless actually doing interviews.
If you are consistently claiming outside of NJ from varying IPs, without having informed NJ of a change of address, sooner or later, NJ may ask you to explain why your claims are submitted from various parts of the country.
Keep very good logs of any job searches done during this period. NJ may still claim you were not Able and Available to take a position because of this travel and request repayment of benefits paid when claimed outside of NJ.
You're right that I want to supplement my job hunt with a little adventure, but wrong to say that it's a vacation. I would have no more leisure time while job hunting in other states than I would at home in NJ. There are only so many jobs to apply for in my rather tightly defined profession in any given week. I'd have just as much time to fill in NJ as I would anywhere else. (Perhaps my screen name prompted that. It was chosen a long time ago, and I'd forgotten I even had an account here in city data).
Not to look a gift horse in the mouth, but is there any printed information verifying the above? (Am I giving away my profession?) I've seen others on the forum say that they've violated a minor point, and had to spend weeks correcting it. I don't want place myself in that position.
Thanks for the suggestion to keep track of my searches. When I claimed in Colorado in 2004 (the last time I was on UI), keeping records was absolutely mandatory, so I've always assumed that every contact had to be recorded.
The irony is that the job hunting sites in my profession are national, and I'd be using the same computer to send the same documents to the same people regardless of where I was located in the U.S. I just don't see why sending my resume to company A from Pennsylvania is "vacationing" while sending the same resume to the same place is "working hard on my job hunt" if I were back in NJ.
Besides the searching for work, you have to be able to accept work immediately. On the off chance, you get a call from an application you submitted for NJ while you're in AZ, you need to head home immediately, even if that means buying a full-fare, short-notice ticket, and forfeiting any value for your nonrefundable return ticket.
I see your point, sort of. You've picked the 1/50 (approximately) chance that an offer for an interview will be in NJ.
Continuing with your hypothetical, supposing I'm in AZ, and a company in Seattle wants to see me on short notice. It seems no more expensive to fly from AZ to WA on short notice than from NJ to WA on the same notice. This assumes, correctly, that if I travel, I would have with me whatever is needed in terms of clothing, money, documents etc to fly to an interview anywhere in the U.S.
One thing I've considered is to travel to places that have clusters of employment in my area, and send resumes "cold" (i.e. without responding to an ad) to employers in that region while I'm in their area and thus available for in-person interviews without imposing the cost of airfare on the employers. Just a thought.
She got the tap turned off very quickly. You're drawing from NJ, and you won't get an appeal hearing scheduled to get the tap turned on nearly as quickly as she did. NJ still seems to be taking about three months, but not so long ago it was taking 6 months for an appeal in NJ. That's a long time with no income. Also, while analyzing the situation, she had ideas on what she should have said to not have problems that were false. The key was that she was willing to drop everything to secure a job.
I'm just trying to point out to you that UI is about getting a job, and you can do what it is you want to do, but know what you are doing so that you don't get the tap cut off assuming you are someone that can't be messing with appeals.
It's not enough to be able to show that you were looking for work. Your changing locations is going to suggest to someone that if offered work from an area that you just left that you probably weren't serious about living and working there and only going through the motions. That's a tough presumption to overcome unless you do things in an explainable and logic way if called on the carpet, and it can happen. Just be prepared if you need the benefits, or do what you want if you don't care if you get the money or not.
I'm just trying to point out to you that UI is about getting a job, and you can do what it is you want to do, but know what you are doing so that you don't get the tap cut off assuming you are someone that can't be messing with appeals.
It's not enough to be able to show that you were looking for work. Your changing locations is going to suggest to someone that if offered work from an area that you just left that you probably weren't serious about living and working there and only going through the motions. That's a tough presumption to overcome unless you do things in an explainable and logic way if called on the carpet, and it can happen. Just be prepared if you need the benefits, or do what you want if you don't care if you get the money or not.
Ok. Very much appreciate your input and the warning of what might happen if suspicions are raised in the UI system.
To reply to the last comment, I DO care whether I get the money or not. But, given a choice between looking for jobs while living at the same old house-share arrangement in my NJ suburb, and looking for jobs just as hard while visiting friends in California or Washington, the ability to temporarily conduct my job hunt elsewhere was appealing.
I may have underestimated how important it was to the UI system to look for jobs in one's home state. I work in a field where people move around the country all the time. It so happens I was living in Colorado before taking the job that led me to NJ ten years ago.
I may have underestimated how important it was to the UI system to look for jobs in one's home state. I work in a field where people move around the country all the time. It so happens I was living in Colorado before taking the job that led me to NJ ten years ago.
NJ doesn't give a hoot if you look for employment in every state in the US and overseas. It very well may, however, question your claims for benefits when you are too frequently claiming from locations other than NJ. Just be prepared to explain why you were claiming from CA, AZ, CO, or wherever, if you are asked. Scheduled job interviews in those areas would go a long way to alleviating NJ's concerns - if you are asked.
Can you just do weekly claims over the phone? If you use your cell phone, how could they know where you are calling from?
That said, you should be ethical.
The data as to where a cell phone call originates can be readily determined, even if it doesn't show up in the caller id field on the recipient's phone. Now, whether the state UI office has thought of this, and implemented the relevant locating feature, I don't know.
I'm new to this, but from my reading, NJ strongly encourages use of the web. As I recall, a beneficiary has to declare that he/she lacks access to a computer to register for benefits using a phone.
In sum, the "pretend I'm calling from Hackensack approach" doesn't work for me.
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