Unemployment Insurance Fraud Spiking from Covid-19 Can Hurt You
I’ve been tracking this in the news, so I thought to update what I'm tracking here in this article in case others need it. I am not worried about this for myself, but I think it is an interesting thing going on at the same time as the Covid-19 crisis. Also, I think it is kind of fun to make these articles on LinkedIn. :)
How the fraud scheme works:
Thieves file unemployment claims on behalf of a stolen identity. That stolen identity could be one of your employees. The thieves manage to receive payments on behalf of the stolen identity and abscond with the money.
How it could affect you:
You may have employees for whom you are paying unemployment, even though those employees are actively working for you, and the benefits are going to identity thieves. Then when your state adjusts your specific unemployment tax rate, you may be stuck with the bill because your rate is specific to what was paid on your company's behalf!
What you should do:
1) Ask your employees to bring you any unemployment letters that have randomly come to them. 2) Ask your mail room to look out for unemployment letters.
If it comes to your attention, via #1 or #2, that someone has filed for unemployment on behalf of one of your employees, you should immediately notify your state authorities. You do not want those charges to eventually show up as an increase in the tax rate your company pays for unemployment.
Some articles on this:
If they can't spot inmates as fraudulent claims, they can't spot fraudulent claims made by bad guys who have stolen your employees' identities:
"The personal information of 30 inmates was used to file the unlawful claims, the department said, which could put the total number of people involved at over 50."
Hundreds of fraud claims flagged by AZDES:
Oh wait, now they say it is 1 million in claims!
Cool they caught them. I wonder how many have gone uncaught:
TWC seems to have a cool algorithm!
Unemployment debit cards showing up at people's houses.
The Department of Labor is getting into it:
I think this one is funny because they don't do any high tech detective work, they just find a bunch of debit cards in a car at a routine traffic stop.
More people caught: