I haven’t been on here in years, but I know that you guys always come through with great advice.
To make the long story short, my husband and I are dealing with a situation where back in 2021 his unemployment account was hacked way after he went back to work, and there were two transactions that ended up in our bank account that should’ve have. We promptly returned the money and have a confirmation letter from the bank.
Fast forward, he ended being laid off again this year, and DOL reduced his benefits due to the presumed ‘overpayment’ that we already returned.
We have a letter from DOL stating that they completed their investigation,
and determined that we were victims of fraud and that his future benefits should not be
‘intercepted’.
We appealed reduction of benefits, and had a hearing yesterday. The referee was condescending, rude, deliberately dismissive and tried to overwhelm us with a torrent of legalese so we pretty much felt like we were being given a punishment with no crime.
My question is - since we know that he is going to rule against us, and we also know that we are completely in the right - is this the end of the road from the legal standpoint, or is there anything else we can do to recoup the money that the state DOL pretty much took from us, twice?
PA Resident here – call your State Rep’s office today, and see if they can get involved. I am astonished at how Harrisburg can’t accomplish anything, yet individual reps are often best at these weird red tape problems. Good luck
@Hippobirdy, yes, we already appealed, and that’s what I was describing - the referee
being disrespectful and rude, and trying to present us as the guilty party.
@BunsenBurner, I haven’t thought of that, will definitely explore, not sure if our case
falls within the scope of the AG’s role.
@greenbutton, yes, we’ve been working with one, but all he pretty much does is takes our information, asks someone from PA UC office to call us back, and then that person basically repeats the ‘party line’ - ‘wait until appeal is scheduled’, but not real help is provided.
Mind boggling how they can live off of our taxes, and then dehumanize someone who’s done the right thing and went through hoops to return the money.