Extra $300 for some PA unemployment claimants could begin in a few weeks

HARRISBURG, Pa. — Some people who are receiving Pennsylvania unemployment benefits could see an extra $300 a week by the end of September.

Those will be retroactive payments for the first three weeks of August.

It’s federal money from the lost wages assistance program.

RELATED: Dept. of L&I works to implement the Lost Wages Assistance program, giving some unemployment claimants an extra $300 per week

Since it’s a payment from FEMA, the state Department of Labor and Industry has to create a new application site for that.

Not everyone though will automatically get that money.

Susan Dickinson with the Department of D&L said, "Your unemployment must be related to COVID-19 disruptions. For individuals on the PUA program, they don’t have to apply because they have already been certifying every week that they are unemployed due to COVID-19 related disruptions. That’s part of the PUA program. It’s the individuals on the regular UC claims, plus all of our extensions or any special programs, those are the ones who will have to apply."

People will be able to self certify on the department of labor and industry website.

However, they can’t do that just yet.

Also, there was an outage on the unemployment website for a few hours over the weekend.

The department says that issue is now fixed.