Federal unemployment payments ending

The Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (FPUC) program is part of the CARES Act that provides an additional $600 to benefit payments, and based on TWC’s contract with the US Department of Labor, the last payable week for FPUC is the week ending July 25, 2020.

The other parts of the CARES Act will be available until the week ending December 26, 2020. This includes Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) which allows self-employed to be eligible for unemployment up to 39 weeks and Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation program (PEUC) provides an additional 13 weeks of unemployment. Regular unemployment insurance does not have an expiration date and can provide up to 26 weeks of unemployment during your benefit year.

Based on TWC’s contract with the US Department of Labor, FPUC is available for the week ending April 04, 2020, through the week ending July 25, 2020. FPUC was authorized by federal law in the CARES Act. While TWC is responsible for overseeing these payments, only the U.S. Congress can extend or make changes to FPUC. This expiration date was set by federal law, and cannot be appealed, waived, or modified by TWC.

The reason that the last payable week for FPUC is the week ending July 25 and not July 31 is because, by law, TWC cannot pay partial week benefits. A full benefit week begins on Sunday and ends on Saturday. July 31 is a Friday, and as a result, the last payable week for July is the week ending July 25 because it’s a Saturday.

Payment requests are made every two weeks. For those who are eligible for benefits and request payment for the weeks of July 18 and July 25, they will receive the additional $600 for both weeks. Those who request payment for the weeks of July 25 and Aug. 1 will receive the additional $600 for the week of July 25 only.

For people who were eligible to receive FPUC for all 17 weeks, the amount of benefits paid adds up to approximately $10,200. While the state has triggered additional benefit including an additional 13 weeks of benefits through State Extended Benefits (EB) and an additional seven weeks of benefits through High Unemployment Period (HUP), a person on regular unemployment benefits could potentially receive up to 59 weeks of benefits. The average weekly benefit payments for regular unemployment is $349 per week. If you add up the benefit payments for 59 weeks, that total is approximately $20,591.

In Cass County, unemployment claims have been trending downward since the week of April 11--the highest number of claims for the year at 152. The latest in claim data is from the week of July 4 in which 75 unemployment claims were made.

For more information, visit www.twc.texas.gov.