I got a notice today about my claim for unemployment insurance. Of course, I’m still employed and never made a claim.
There was a second letter saying they had spotted that someone had made a fraudulent claim and they were tracking it down, along with assurances that it won’t affect me at all.
I had heard of this scam. I’m trying to figure out how it works, since the DOL always checks with the employer. All that I can figure is that they hope to catch someone who has lost their job but hasn’t applied yet.
Oh, and they had my SSN. I froze my credit reports awhile ago, so that should be OK.
I think part of is that while they may have checked with the employer in normal times, with the spike in unemployment due to COVID they just don’t have the manpower to check every unemployment claim. That, plus political pressure to get money to those who are legitimately unemployed quickly, has led some state’s unemployment agencies to send the money first, and verify unemployment later (if at all). So the scammers are hoping that they’ll get some money before they discover the claim is fraudulent, by which point they’ll have taken the money and ran.
“I” have applied for UI in two different states in the last few months. (Yes, my credit is now locked down, my employer is aware of the problems, and I have notified both states involved.)
Next question: why would a state, even one in a hurry, approve UI benefits for somebody whose address AND last employer was not in that state? Both DOL had my correct mailing address and sent verification requests to my correct employer, so I’m not sure what the game was.
I spent some time doing call center work for a state’s Pandemic Unemployment system last fall. I too was puzzled that there were sometimes people who did not have an address in that state. I have to assume it was because the person had worked / lived there, but moved away due to the pandemic - and was considered under the original state’s program. Approval rules were above my pay grade, so I didn’t try to find out anything further.
I know they did start paying benefits right away, at least in some cases, because a lot of the calls I got were from people whose benefits had stopped and they wanted to know why. Usually it was because they wanted proof of identity. This was well into the pandemic, I suspect they were being a lot more diligent by the time I got on board.
The scammers were definitely becoming more sophisticated; one of the pieces of ID required was a Social Security card and there was at least one that was very obviously a fake when you looked at a real one. If you didn’t know what a real one looked like, it would have passed muster (these were photographed and uploaded, not shown in person). I wouldn’t think it would be all that hard to fake a more convincing one, either - it’s just heavy-duty paper.
I don’t know what methods they used to check to see if you were earning money anywhere but they did have stuff in place; being overwhelmed early on, though, I suspect that went by the wayside.