Following the discovery of duplicate payments of unemployment benefits and an effort to take that money out of thousands of resident bank accounts, Governor Laura Kelly has announced resources now available to affected residents.
The governor announced a duplicate payment hotline, 785-580-2602, and an email, KDOL.duplicateconcerns@ks.gov, for residents to report their situations.
These new resources were established after about 4,500 residents needing unemployment benefits due to coronavirus received a duplicate payment, only to have the Labor Department use what’s called a clawback to take that money out of bank accounts. An untold number of residents were overdrawn by that maneuver, and Kelly’s administration is also researching whether some residents had their scheduled benefit money clawed out of their accounts and went into overdraft status as a result. Word of the clawback came to light Monday, shortly after Delia Garcia’s resignation as Labor secretary was announced.
Residents needing help processing questions about Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (FPUC), Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) or Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation (PEUC) that are not related to the duplicate payments are told to call 785-296-5000 or go online to www.getkansasbenefits.gov.
