From The NJDOL:

TRENTON – The New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development received 33,000 initial unemployment claims last week, the second uptick in new claims in as many weeks, as the total number of New Jersey workers who have applied for unemployment since mid-March approached 1.3 million.

New Jersey also sent a record $999 million in benefits to claimants last week, and a total of $8.2 billion in federal and state benefits to workers since COVID-19 sidelined much of the state’s workforce.

The Department stood up a new contracted call center last week to augment services provided by existing call center staff. This allows the Labor Department to respond to more phone inquiries and also elevate the claims that need a more experienced agent to resolve.

“Early feedback from our new call center indicates many of the workers who have called have complex wage claims or we are waiting for federally required earnings records from another state or the applicant was denied unemployment benefits but has filed an appeal,” said Labor Commissioner Robert Asaro-Angelo. “Now that we have front-line agents performing essential intake functions, we have been able to shift more experienced claims agents exclusively to these complex cases.”

“Our goal remains to help as many people through the process of creating an account, applying for benefits, and claiming their weekly benefits as quickly as possible.”

The weekly totals of new unemployment claims are:

Eligible claimants have received $2.6 billion in state unemployment payments since mid-March and $5.6 billion in federal benefits through the CARES Act.

Below is the weekly breakdown of  payments (in millions):

NA: Benefit not applicable during the indicated weeks.

FPUC, PUA and PEUC are federal programs authorized by Congress under the CARES Act. FPUC provides an additional $600 weekly benefit to anyone collecting unemployment for weeks ending April 4 through July 25. PUA provides benefits to newly eligible populations such as self-employed workers, independent contractors and those who do not have enough recent earnings to qualify for regular unemployment benefits, as well as for newly qualifying reasons such as being unable to work because due to caring for others or for their own COVID-19 illness. PEUC provides 13 weeks of federal benefits for those who have exhausted 26 weeks of state unemployment.

For more information on state or federal unemployment programs, visit myunemployment.nj.gov.

Claimants collecting unemployment must certify for benefits each week to continue to receive payments. Information on certifying for unemployment can be found here: https://myunemployment.nj.gov/labor/myunemployment/schedule.shtml

Anyone looking for work is encouraged to visit New Jersey’s jobs portal — jobs.covid19.nj.gov — which matches jobseekers with immediate openings in industries such as food distribution, warehousing and health care.

For national unemployment data, visit https://www.dol.gov/ui/data.pdf. For archived NJ claims data, visit https://oui.doleta.gov/unemploy/DataDashboard.asp.

*This represents the final number for the week ended June 20. The number listed for NJ by US Department of Labor – 32,350 – is based on advanced reporting.