Q: When Should Someone Cancel Their Unemployment Insurance? - Central Coast News KION/KCBA

Q: When Should Someone Cancel Their Unemployment Insurance?

A: Our KION Question came from Jay in Capitola.  Several questions were asked about unemployment insurance.  Here's what was emailed in by Jay:

"If someone is on unemployment insurance and gets a full time job should they cancel their unemployment insurance? How do you do that? Just stop submitting the form? Also, what if you make less working full time than you did on unemployment? Does one have to cancel because they are working 40 hours even though they are underemployed and not making much (less than unemployment)?"

Central Coast News spoke to California's Employment Development Department.  Here's the response from Dan Stephens, of the Communications Office:

When an individual returns back to work, there is no requirement for the individual to cancel a claim.  For clarity sake, there are certain circumstances that must be met to "cancel" a claim.  A claim in what we call "continued claim status" where payments and/or a disqualification have been made cannot be cancelled.  If a person is in continued claim status and has subsequently found full-time employment, the individual may report their full-time employment on either their continued claim form or call one of the UI Toll Free Numbers.

An individual may certainly opt not to submit his/her continued claim form and payments will cease as the continued claim form is the vehicle to certify for UI benefits.

The California Unemployment Insurance Code, Section 1252, provides for certain conditions to be considered "unemployed."  One condition is, "Any week of less than full-time work…"  Therefore, an individual working full-time (regardless of the individual's new wage earnings being less than UI benefit payments) is no longer unemployed.