N.Y. Labor Law § 591: Eligibility for benefits

§ 591. Eligibility for benefits. * 1. Unemployment. Benefits, except

as provided in section five hundred ninety-one-a of this title, shall be

paid only to a claimant who is totally unemployed or partially

unemployed. A claimant who is receiving benefits under this article

shall not be denied such benefits pursuant to this subdivision or to

subdivision two of this section because of such claimant's service on a

grand or petit jury of any state or of the United States.

* NB Effective until December 7, 2027

* 1. Unemployment. Benefits shall be paid only to a claimant who is

totally unemployed or partially unemployed. A claimant who is receiving

benefits under this article shall not be denied such benefits pursuant

to this subdivision or to subdivision two of this section because of

such claimant's service on a grand or petit jury of any state or of the

United States.

* NB Effective December 7, 2027

* 2. Availability and capability. Except as provided in section five

hundred ninety-one-a of this title, no benefits shall be payable to any

claimant who is not capable of work or who is not ready, willing and

able to work in his usual employment or in any other for which he is

reasonably fitted by training and experience.

* NB Effective until December 7, 2027

* 2. Availability, capability, and work search. No benefits shall be

payable to any claimant who is not capable of work or who is not ready,

willing and able to work in his or her usual employment or in any other

for which he or she is reasonably fitted by training and experience and

who is not actively seeking work. In order to be actively seeking work a

claimant must be engaged in systematic and sustained efforts to find

work. The commissioner shall promulgate regulations defining systematic

and sustained efforts to find work and setting standards for the proof

of work search efforts. Such regulations shall take into account the

need for claimants to provide child care for their child or children.

* NB Effective December 7, 2027

3. Vacation period or holiday.

(a) Compensation paid to a claimant for any day during a paid vacation

period, or for a paid holiday, shall be considered compensation from

employment and shall be included in the calculation of a claimant's

benefit for partial unemployment as set forth in subdivision five of

section five hundred ninety of this article.

(b) The term "vacation period", as used in this subdivision, means the

time designated for vacation purposes in accordance with the collective

bargaining agreement or the employment contract or by the employer and

the claimant, his union, or his representative. If either the collective

bargaining agreement or the employment contract is silent as to such

time, or if there be no collective bargaining agreement or employment

contract, then the time so designated in writing and announced to the

employees in advance by the employer is to be considered such vacation

period.

(c) A paid vacation period or a paid holiday is a vacation period or a

holiday for which a claimant is given a payment or allowance not later

than thirty days thereafter, directly by his employer or through a fund,

trustee, custodian or like medium provided the amount thereof has been

contributed solely by the employer on behalf of the claimant and the

amount so contributed by the employer is paid over in full to the

claimant without any deductions other than those required by law, even

if such payment or allowance be deemed to be rumuneration for prior

services rendered as an accrued contractual right, and irrespective of

whether the employment has or has not been terminated.

(d) Any agreement expressed or implied by a claimant or by his union

or other representative to a plant or department shut down for vacation

purposes is not of itself to be considered either a withdrawal by such

employee from the labor market during the time of such vacation shut

down or to render him unavailable for employment during the time of such

vacation shut down.

4. (a) An unemployed individual shall be eligible to receive benefits

with respect to any week only if such individual participates in

reemployment services, such as job search assistance services, available

under any state or federal law, if the individual has been determined to

be likely to exhaust regular benefits and needs reemployment services

pursuant to a profiling system established by the commissioner, unless

the commissioner determines that:

(i) the individual has completed such services; or

(ii) there is justifiable cause for the claimant's failure to

participate in such services.

(b) Such profiling system shall be established pursuant to a plan of

the department which shall include, but not be limited to:

(i) specification of the profiling methodology, including factors used

to determine a claimant's required participation in reemployment

services and the statistical relationship of such factors to the

exhaustion of benefits by certain claimants;

(ii) standards to be used to insure that all claimants are uniformly

evaluated against the profiling criteria;

(iii) a description of criteria to be used to make assignments to

basic reemployment services offered;

(iv) procedures for notification of the right of appeal and for appeal

by a claimant of the profiling assessment and referral of the

department;

(v) an evaluation of the extent to which reemployment services are

available throughout the state and accessible to claimants;

(vi) a demonstration of efforts by the department to coordinate with

the local providers offering reemployment services, to avoid duplication

of services among providers offering similar reemployment services to

the same participant group;

(vii) policies and procedures for referrals to reemployment services,

including referrals to providers other than the department; and

(viii) guidelines governing the extent to which education and skills

or occupational training shall be offered.

(c) The department shall, at a time and in a manner consistent with

federal requirements, submit a report to the temporary president of the

senate and the speaker of the assembly on the profiling system

authorized herein except that such report:

(i) shall be submitted to the temporary president of the senate and

the speaker of the assembly no later than September first, nineteen

hundred ninety-five and annually thereafter, and

(ii) shall include data on the number of individuals profiled and the

number of profiled individuals exhausting benefits as well as a

description of the service or services provided to profiled individuals

and the number of individuals referred for reemployment services during

the program year ending the preceding June thirtieth.

5. Maximum combined payments. If a claimant is receiving benefits

pursuant to subdivision six of section fifteen of the workers'

compensation law, the unemployment benefits to which a claimant may be

entitled pursuant to this article shall be limited to the difference

between the amount of workers' compensation benefits and one hundred

percent of the claimant's average weekly wage.

6. Dismissal pay. (a) No benefits shall be payable to a claimant for

any week during a dismissal period for which a claimant receives

dismissal pay if such weekly dismissal pay exceeds the claimant's

maximum weekly benefit rate plus the claimant's partial benefit credit.

(b) The term "dismissal pay", as used in this subdivision, means one

or more payments made by an employer to an employee due to his or her

separation from service of the employer regardless of whether the

employer is legally bound by contract, statute or otherwise to make such

payments. The term does not include payments for pension, retirement,

accrued leave, and health insurance or payments for supplemental

unemployment benefits.

(c) The term "dismissal period", as used in this subdivision, means

the time designated for weeks of dismissal pay attributable to the

claimant's weekly earnings in accordance with the collective bargaining

agreement, employment contract, employer's dismissal policy, dismissal

agreement with the employer or other such agreement. If no such

agreement, contract or policy designates a dismissal period, then the

dismissal period shall be the time designated in writing in advance by

the employer to be considered the dismissal period. If no time period is

designated, the dismissal period shall commence on the day after the

claimant's last day of employment. If the dismissal payment is in a lump

sum amount or for an indefinite period, dismissal payments shall be

allocated on a weekly basis from the day after the claimant's last day

of employment and the claimant shall not be eligible for benefits for

any week for which it is determined that the claimant receives dismissal

pay. The amount of dismissal pay shall be allocated based on the

claimant's actual weekly remuneration paid by the employer during his or

her employment or, if such amount cannot be determined, the amount of

the claimant's average weekly wage for the highest calendar quarter.

(d) Notwithstanding the foregoing, the provisions of this subdivision

shall not apply during any weeks in which the initial payment of

dismissal pay is made more than thirty days from the last day of the

claimant's employment.