UPDATE 09/21: The second and final round of $900 in LWA payments (3 x $300 for weeks ending 08/23, 08/30, and 09/06) will be released this week: $300 on Tuesday, $300 on Wednesday, and $300 on Thursday.

UPDATE 09/17: NY released three payments of $300 ($900 total) of LWA payments today. This is for weeks ending 08/02, 08/09, and 08/16. Look at your Payment History page to check if your $900 was released.

Related Articles:
Extra $300 a Week in Unemployment: Lost Wages Assistance
Don’t Lose Out on $900 (or more) in Lost Wages Assistance

OVERVIEW

Great news! All eligible people should receive a total of six weeks of Lost Wages Assistance, which is an extra $300 per week on top of the regular Unemployment payments. At $300 a week, that’s $1,800 before taxes. The New York Department of Labor announced that they will send out the first three weeks of Lost Wages Assistance ($900) this coming week, as that is what NY received so far from FEMA. The remaining 3 weeks should follow in the near future.

The six weeks are retroactive payments for the weeks ending

1. Aug 2  – (week beginning Jul 27)
2. Aug 9  – (week beginning Aug 3)
3. Aug 16  – (week beginning Aug 10)
4. Aug 23  – (week beginning Aug 17)
5. Aug 30  – (week beginning Aug 24)
6. Sep 6  – (week beginning Aug 31)

Am I eligible for Lost Wages Assistance?

Read ‘Extra $300 a Week in Unemployment: Lost Wage Assistance’ to see if you are eligible.

What do I need to do?

The NY Department of Labor is sending emails and text messages today (Friday, September 11, 2020) to let you know if you need to certify that you are unemployed due to COVID, or if you don’t need to do anything. Most people will get the $1,800 automatically without having to do anything.

If you need to certify before receiving the LWA funds, you should receive a DocuSign email to certify (from dse@docusign.net).

If you don’t receive any message from the DOL, you can simply call 833-491-0632 and try to certify. If you don’t need to certify, the automated system will let you know.

Who needs to certify?

Most people (2 million in NY) on Unemployment during August certified that they were unable to work due to Covid when they applied for Unemployment, so they won’t need to do anything.

Many other people (435,000 in NY) are either on Unemployment not related to the pandemic, or they applied for Unemployment right in the beginning of the pandemic, before the application was updated to include an option to state that they are unemployed due to Covid. These people need to certify.

So if you applied for Unemployment back in March, before the “new” form was made, you will need to certify that your lack of work was due to Covid in order to receive the $1800 LWA.

The DOL tells me I need to certify. What am I certifying?

The certification is a statement that the reason you lost your job or had reduced hours was due to Covid. Even if the reason you lost your job is not due to Covid, you can still certify if at some point you had difficulty finding a job due to Covid.

How do I certify?

• Either by completing the DocuSign
• Or by calling 833-491-0632

When do I need to certify?

• You can certify starting today, Friday, September 11th.
• If you certify after Tuesday, September 15th, 5:00pm, your LWA payments will be delayed (and you run the risk of losing out on LWA completely).
• If you need to certify, you will only need to do so one time.

Summary

It looks like all eligible people will get six weeks of LWA. NY will disburse the LWA for 3 weeks (Aug 2, 9 and 16) this coming week and another three weeks in the near future. Most people will get the $1,800 without having to do anything. Some people will need to certify before receiving the funds. Reminder: If you didn’t yet sign up for unemployment and you are eligible, do so quickly or you may end up losing out on LWA, if it’s not too late already.

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