Restarting Benefits

Restarting Benefits after Temporary Work

When you take a temporary job and earn more than your weekly benefit amount, your benefits will stop. When your temporary assignment ends, you need to re-file for unemployment. The same rules for leaving this new employer apply; if you voluntarily quit or you are fired for just cause, you may not be eligible for benefits.

Re-Filing for Benefits

When you apply for unemployment benefits, you establish an active unemployment account for 52 weeks. This is referred to has a benefit year. When your benefit year ends and you still require unemployment assistance, your claim will stop and require you to file a new claim. To be approved for benefits in a new benefit year, you must have earned five times your weekly benefit amount.

Example - Sue filed for benefits on January 1, 2014  and stopped in May (5 months). She was laid off again in the middle of December so she filed a new claim. Since her benefit year ended after 52 weeks, her benefit stopped and she had to apply again. Because Sue’s benefit was $100 a week, she had to have earned at least $500 during the last year to qualify for a new claim.

Unemployment Benefit Extensions

Qualified Tennesseans are only eligible for a maximum of  26 weeks of unemployment insurance in a year. If you exhaust your benefit, no extensions are available. In order to be eligible for unemployment again, you will have to meet several requirements:

  1. You must have additional earnings from a "covered employer."
  2. You must be laid off by no fault of your own.
  3. And, you must apply after your benefit year has ended.