The Pennsylvania Office of Unemployment Compensation recently provided important information on employees impacted by COVID-19.

Employees may be entitled to unemployment compensation benefits if:

• The employer temporarily closes or goes out of business because of COVID-19.
• The employer reduces an employee’s hours because of COVID-19.
• The employer has told the employee not to work because the employer feels the employee might get or spread COVID-19.
• The employee has been told to quarantine or self-isolate, or the employee lives/works in a county under a government-recommended mitigation efforts.
• Contributory employers who are temporarily closed because of the COVID-19 virus will be granted relief from charges and their unemployment compensation tax will not increase.

The one-week waiting period to receive unemployment compensation benefits has been suspended and employees do not need to prove they have applied or searched for a new job to maintain their benefits.

Employees are also not required to register with CareerLink.

If anyone has any questions on these new rules, please contact me or anyone in the Barley Snyder Employment Practice Group.

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