New JerseyA4047220th Legislature (2024-2025)HouseWALLET

Revises unemployment compensation law.

Sponsored By: Cody D. Miller (Democratic), Paul D. Moriarty (Democratic), Raj Mukherji (Democratic), William B. Sampson IV (Democratic), Anthony S. Verrelli (Democratic)

Signed by Governor

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Bill Overview

Analyzed Economic Effects

18 provisions identified: 7 benefits, 5 costs, 6 mixed.

Full repayment waivers for qualifying claimants

Claimants can request full forgiveness of unemployment or temporary disability overpayments if they did not misrepresent or hide important facts. Qualifying reasons include death, disability that prevents work, agency or employer error, or an employer's failure to provide information. Recovery that violates the law's fairness standard also qualifies. The director must grant qualifying requests. No request is needed when the director discovers a qualifying agency or employer error and confirms no misrepresentation.

Faster claim decisions and stronger worker protections

Employers must give newly unemployed workers printed benefit instructions and immediately report electronically when those instructions identify the unemployment start date. Employers generally have seven calendar days to answer information requests; initial decisions are due within three weeks, provided necessary information arrives. If employers omit required separation information and ignore follow-up requests, the division can use other evidence, including a claimant's affidavit. Payments based on that decision begin immediately, with appeal rules governing continued or withheld payments. Employers must prove alleged misconduct or gross misconduct with written evidence before a decision; willful reporting failures face penalties.

Faster unemployment access during labor disputes

For claims starting January 1, 2022, or later, the labor-dispute waiting period falls from 30 days to 14 days. Benefits are payable during portions of those 14 days when the employer uses replacement workers, including temporarily reassigned employees. No waiting period applies when the dispute causes no work stoppage. Exceptions also remain for employers preventing work or violating agreements or applicable work laws.

Full-time students can keep unemployment eligibility

Full-time school attendance or a school break does not by itself block unemployment benefits. Students must still qualify, remain able and available to work, and actively look for work.

Job changes need not block unemployment

Leaving one job to accept another does not disqualify you when the new job starts within seven days. The new job must offer at least as many weekly hours or as much pay as the old job. If the first employer ends your job early, the seven days run from your planned departure date.

Stronger unemployment protections for school workers

A school return offer counts as reasonable assurance only if authorized, for the same work capacity, and highly likely to produce a job. It cannot depend on factors within the school's control; offered earnings below 90% of current year or term earnings fail. The state reviews each case, including whether economic terms are considerably worse. Schools must report return-offer details and workers lacking assurance at least 10 business days before the year or term ends. A late offer statement creates a rebuttable presumption of no assurance; a timely statement alone does not prove assurance.

Disqualifications can delay workers' extended benefits

Beginning December 12, 2024, claimants disqualified under regular-benefit misconduct or suitable-work rules must finish that disqualification before receiving extended benefits. They must also meet the remaining extended-benefit requirements. Workers who exhausted regular benefits and are fired or suspended for work-related misconduct lose extended benefits starting that week. They must earn at least four times their weekly extended benefit to qualify again. The same earnings test applies to those with proven good prospects in their usual occupation who, without good cause, refuse suitable work, fail to apply when directed, or fail to resume directed customary self-employment.

Federal pandemic repayment waivers face limits

New Jersey can waive covered CARES Act unemployment debts only when claimants were without fault and repayment violates the law's fairness standard. Covered programs include Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation, Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation, Mixed Earners Unemployment Compensation, and Pandemic Unemployment Assistance. The rule also covers the first week of regular benefits reimbursed under the CARES Act. Federal laws, regulations, or directives that prohibit waivers still control.

Benefit repayment comes with appeal protections

Claimants generally must repay unemployment or temporary disability benefits they were not entitled to receive, unless a waiver applies. Written notices allow appeals within 20 calendar days after confirmed receipt or 30 calendar days after mailing. Recovery waits until the applicable deadline passes and any timely appeal is resolved. New Jersey may use reciprocal agreements to recover state or permitted federal unemployment debts by reducing benefits otherwise payable. Employer accounts are not charged for agency errors the employer did not cause.

Broader dependent benefits with more paperwork

Unemployment claimants can claim an unemployed, unmarried adult child whose blindness or disability began before age 22. Social Security's Disabled Adult Child standard applies, and current eligibility for that benefit conclusively proves dependent status. Married claimants claiming dependents must provide their spouse's Social Security number; child claims require the claimant's latest filed federal tax return. The division checks wage records when a spouse is reported unemployed and contacts the last employer if earnings appear.

Extended benefits bring stricter job-search rules

Beginning December 12, 2024, the employment service must refer extended-benefit claimants to suitable jobs; claimants must document sustained job searches. Failing to search, accept suitable work, or apply for referred work blocks benefits until four later weeks of work and earnings of four times the weekly benefit. Suitable jobs must fit the claimant's abilities, follow labor standards, and pay above extended benefits plus supplemental benefits. Pay must also meet the higher federal, state, or local minimum wage. Regular-benefit suitability rules apply with proven good prospects in the usual occupation; exceptions protect against certain unwritten or unlisted offers and regular-rule denials.

More domestic workers gain unemployment coverage

After the effective date of P.L.2023, c.262, private-home domestic work counts as employment under a broader payment test. The employer must pay at least $1,000 in employment pay during the current or previous calendar year. This replaces the prior test of $1,000 in cash pay during a calendar quarter. Qualifying workers gain unemployment coverage, while households employing them can face related employment duties.

Employers get unemployment tax rate protection

For fiscal year 2024, employers pay unemployment contributions using column E of the state's experience-rating table. If the actual fund reserve ratio produces a lower-rate column, employers pay those lower rates instead. The provision does not list the resulting rate amounts.

Workers fund disability and leave increases

Worker contributions pay all added state disability costs caused by weekly benefit-rate increases starting July 1, 2020. Employer contributions do not fund those added costs. Worker contributions also fund family-leave costs caused by benefit-rate and maximum-duration increases starting that date. This provision does not set an individual contribution rate or dollar amount.

Stronger benefit fraud checks and fines

The unemployment and temporary disability division must create staff to investigate and enforce covered violations. Electronic death records must support checks against unemployment and temporary disability payments to deceased people. Corrections, courts, and counties must supply electronic identifying records for unemployment incarceration checks; counties supply records not sent to the courts. The labor department must fine people found to have fraudulently obtained covered federal unemployment benefits. Covered programs include federal civilian and ex-service-member benefits, trade and disaster aid, and federal extensions or increases; no fine amount is stated.

Penalties target employer unemployment tax manipulation

Knowingly breaking or attempting to break employment-experience transfer rules, or advising others to do so, triggers penalties. The fine is the greater of $5,000 or 25% of contributions underreported or attempted to be underreported. The fine also covers knowingly seeking lower rates through concealment or misrepresentation. Prohibited transfer conduct is a fourth-degree crime; knowing conduct includes deliberate ignorance or reckless disregard.

Online claims expand with processing limits

Claimants can certify, cancel, or close claims online 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Actions after 7:00 p.m. wait until the next scheduled posting date for processing. When digital identity credentials are requested, the division must offer alternatives, including phone or in-person help, without delaying claims. Identity, application, and appeal systems must prominently offer representative appointments when help is not immediately available. Denied requests for digital identity credentials require written decisions that claimants can appeal.

Worker payroll deductions shift between funds

Beginning January 1, 2024, the standard worker unemployment-fund rate falls from 0.3825% to 0.3625% of covered wages. A separate 0.0200% worker contribution funds unemployment administration starting the same date, leaving the combined standard rate unchanged. Workers in government jobs whose employers make payments instead of regular contributions have a 0.0625% unemployment-fund rate.

Sponsors & Cosponsors

Cosponsors

Marenco, Julio
Affiliation unavailable
McCann Stamato, Barbara
Affiliation unavailable
Angela V. McKnight
Democratic • Senate
Verlina Reynolds-Jackson
Democratic • House
Gabriel Rodriguez
Democratic • House

Roll Call Votes

All Roll Calls

Yes: 91 • No: 25

Senate vote • 10/28/2024

3RDG FINAL PASSAGE

Yes: 36 • No: 3

House vote • 6/28/2024