Philadelphia Legal Assistance

What's new at PLA? Check out our June 2021 newsletter! https://mailchi.mp/1a6c7ea09c95/springintoaction-5240474

Attention Unemployment Compensation Claimants! The UC system black out period as begun. Access to online information about your UC claim is currently unavailable. No new or weekly claims can be filed until June 8th. If you need more information or have questions about the new UC system, check out UCHelp.org

PLA Attorney Catherine Anderson will be participating in today's rountable with Rep. Rick Krajewski and Rep. Elizabeth Fiedler to discuss supports available to families who rent their home. Tune in at 1pm using the following link: https://www.pahouse.com/PolicyCommittee/events?ID=119843

The UC system in Pennsylvania is hard for workers to navigate. UCHelp.org - a new online resource for workers - is here to help answer your questions and guide you through the process. Check it out today: www.uchelp.org, and tag a person in the comments who would find this resource helpful. All information on the site is provided by Philadelphia Legal Assistance and is only intended as legal information, not advice.

If your IRS refund was taken for a past IRS debt that you disagree with, you have 2 years to make a claim to get it back! Read our full Tax Tip Tuesday post to learn more: https://philalegal.org//was-your-irs-refund-taken-pay-past

REMINDER: IF YOU WANT TO BE PAID ON TIME, ALL REGULAR UC CLAIMANTS SHOULD FILE FOR THE WEEK ENDING MAY 29. File on May 30, 31, June 1, or June 2nd. You will not be able to file through the system from June 3 to June 7.

Supervising Attorney Julia Simon-Mishel joined Senator Art Haywood this morning for an update on unemployment compensation programs. As a reminder, the PEUC and PUA programs are NOT currently available. Do not file. The government is working on setting up the extensions but has not provided any information about when they will be available. Once they are available, you will be able to claim and be paid going back to Dec. 27, 2020. You will also still get the extra $300 per... week as part of your back benefits. There are also delays with EB, but individuals on that program should continue to file. Individuals on regular UC should continue to file and have begun receiving the extra $300 (paid the week after you receive your regular benefits).

ARE YOU A GIG WORKER WHO GETS DRIVING ASSIGNMENTS THROUGH AN APP? If so, you should now be eligible for regular Pennsylvania Unemployment Compensation and should file a new application for UC (www.uc.pa.gov) instead of continuing on PUA. Over the summer the Pennsylvania Supreme Court issued a decision that should now make your earnings from app-based driving count towards a regular unemployment claim. While it will be a big of a longer process to get onto UC, you will:... 1) Qualify for a higher weekly benefit rate than PUA, because UC will use your gross earnings 2) Qualify for more weeks, as the PUA extension is for 11 weeks and a new UC application could provide up to 26 weeks. The companies you work for refuse to provide your wages to the government, so you will need to follow up and provide them to the government after you apply. We will be following up with more instructions about how to do that! We recommend applying this week! If you are trying to figure out how to explain your separation from work, see the graphic below.

Happening NOW! Attorneys Julia Simon-Mishel and Omeed Firouzi are live now to provide updates about state and federal unemployment programs and IRS direct payments. Julia and Omeed will first provide info and then answer questions from the audience. PLEASE WAIT to ask questions until the presentation is over, otherwise Julia and Omeed will not see your question. Unfortunately we cannot provide individualized legal advice about claims during this Facebook Live. You can find yo...ur local legal aid provider here: https://palegalaid.net/legal-aid-providers-in-pa For more resources, visit our web pages: philalegal.org/unemploymentCOVID19 https://www.philalegal.org/caresactextensionfaq and philalegal.org/stimuluscheck See more

TAX TIP TUESDAY! What is the new Form 1099-NEC? Form 1099-NEC is a new tax form that the IRS is requiring companies to use to report paying non-employee compensation of more than $600. These payments used to be reported on Form 1099-MISC. Companies who pay non-employee compensation are required to give this form to the people they pay by February 1 and also file a copy with the IRS.... If you're self-employed or you run your own trade or business, you will likely get one or more 1099-NEC forms by February 1. When you file your 2020 tax return, you need to make sure you report all of your self-employment income on a Schedule C, whether or not you received a 1099-NEC. The IRS requires you to keep records of your self-employment income and also of any business expenses that you claim on your Schedule C. But what if you were an employee and were still given a 1099-NEC? Sometimes, employers misclassify their employees as independent contractors and give them a 1099, or pay them in cash and give them no tax forms at all, instead of giving them a W-2 with taxes withheld. When employers misclassify their employees as independent contractors, employees owe more tax than they should, and they can lose out on important benefits. Just because your employer calls you an independent contractor, it doesn’t mean you are one; it’s the facts of your work and whether you work under someone else’s control that determine your true status and your rightful tax obligations. If you have questions or think you were misclassified, contact the Taxpayer Support Clinic at PLA. We can help ensure you don’t pay more than you should. For more information on worker misclassification, please visit our webpage on misclassification here for additional resources: www.philalegal.org/misclassification

New Stimulus Payment Update & How to Avoid Scams! The new round of stimulus payments is now official! $600 per adult (unless an adult can be claimed as a dependent) and each child under age 17. You should get the payment automatically in January if you filed a 2019 tax return or used the non-filer tool to get the first stimulus, or if you receive Social Security, SSI, Railroad, or Veterans benefits.... If you don’t get the payment by the time you file your taxes for 2020, you can claim the payment on your 2020 return. You may also be able to claim the first stimulus payment on your 2020 return if you missed out on some or all of what you were eligible for. BEWARE of SCAMMERS! The IRS will not call, text, email, or contact you on social media asking for personal or bank account informationeven related to stimulus payments. Do not respond to texts or emails with attachments or links claiming to have special information about stimulus payments or refunds.

The new COVID-19 relief bill has been signed into law! Curious as to how it impacts you? Join us on January 5, 2021 at 11am. PLA Attorneys Julia Simon-Mishel and Omeed Firouzi will be live on our Facebook page discussing unemployment benefits, direct payments, and changes to your taxes. They will also do a brief Q&A at the end of the presentation. Tune in LIVE on our Facebook page or catch the recording after.

PLA is looking for a justice focused, passionate fundraiser to join our team as Development Director! If you think you are a good fit please apply now or share widely with your circles. Read the full job description here: https://philalegal.org/node/460

Today we are recognizing and extending gratitude to the Philadelphia Unemployment Project! PUP believes that, once organized, working people and the unemployed are a powerful, collective voice. In response to the difficult economic conditions created by COVID-19, PUP partnered with our Consumer Housing unit to support these folks with their mortgages. Together, we embarked on a City-wide outreach campaign to increase awareness around the Pandemic Mortgage Assistance Program.... We also worked together to complete applications to the program, appeal denials, and encourage administrative bodies to change eligibility requirements that acted as a barrier for many homeowners. We are thankful for our counterparts at PUP, whose time and insight makes our team at PLA stronger! #WeCreateJusticeTogether To learn more about PUP's work, follow them on Facebook at @phila_up

Struggling to keep up with mortgage payments? Depending on who owns your mortgage, the deadline to apply for a forbearance could be as early as February 28th, 2021! Don’t wait! Call your mortgage company to request a forbearance today. For more information, visit https://philalegal.org/MortgageCOVID or call #SaveYourHomePhilly at (215) 334-HOME (4663)

FURTHER UPDATE FOR PUA CLAIMANTS: Please see the graphic below -- there will be a delay before the PUA system allows you to start filing again. The state government and the PUA system vendor need to update the portal and add in the additional weeks. You should keep checking every week to see if you are now able to file weekly certifications. You should NOT file a new application for PUA. You will be continuing your current claim.... If we hear anything new or different from the government, we will post an additional update. You can find out video on using ID.Me here: https://www.facebook.com/399574260130964/videos/382868376310079 You only need to use ID.Me if you have a message in your PUA message center asking you to verify your identity through ID.Me.

Is the IRS taking a portion of your wages, savings, or Social Security to pay off a tax debt? This is called a levy, and if it is cutting into your daily living expenses PLA can help you get them to stop based on the Taxpayer Bill of Rights. Here are a few rights you have if the IRS is levying your income:... The Right to a Fair and Just Tax System: The IRS should consider your ability to pay if they plan to levy you. If you can’t pay your tax debt while still affording food, housing, and other essentials, the IRS can stop the levy and allow you to pay in smaller monthly installments, or pay nothing at all for as long as you can’t afford to pay, a status called Currently Not Collectible. The Right to Privacy: To get into an installment plan or Currently Not Collectible, you may have to provide the IRS with information about your income, expenses, and assets. When you do, remember that the IRS should only ask (and you only need to tell them) about financial information that is relevant to whether you can pay your debt. Right to Retain Representation: If you are having trouble reaching the IRS, or convincing them to stop the levy you can have a lawyer or other representative talk to the IRS for you. Philadelphia Legal Assistance provides free representation for low-income taxpayers in Philadelphia, including helping people stop IRS levies. If you are looking for help stopping an IRS levy, reach out to us Monday-Thursday from 9:30 a.m. to 12 p.m 215-981-3800. This is one installment of a series of posts related to the IRS’s #TaxpayerBillofRights

Tax Tip Tuesday! Your 2020 Tax Return: What To Do If You Don’t Get Your W-2 By February 1st Employers are required to give you your W-2 by February 1st, 2020. If you don’t receive your W-2 by February 1st, try asking your employer to send it to you. If that doesn’t work, you can call the IRS at 1-800-829-1040 to request assistance. The IRS will ask you for your dates of employment and the employer’s name, full address, and phone number. If you are having trouble with this, P...hiladelphia Legal Assistance’s Taxpayer Support Clinic may be able to help! Here is some more information about your W-2: If you are an employee, your employer is required to report the total wages they paid you in 2020 and the taxes they took out of your pay. Your employer does this by filing a Form W-2 with the Social Security Administration (SSA). This is how you get credit for Social Security benefits, like retirement and disability. Your employer is also required to give you copies of the W-2 to use when doing your 2020 taxes. The information on the W-2 should generally match the Year to Date amounts from the last paystub you received in 2020. The SSA shares the information from your W-2 with the IRS so that the IRS can figure out if your tax return is correct or not. If your employer doesn’t file your W-2 correctly with the SSA, this can delay your tax return and your refund from the IRS, and you may need to prove your income to the IRS using paystubs, bank statements, copies of cancelled checks, and/or a letter from your employer. If your employer took out Pennsylvania and Philadelphia income taxes from your pay, they will also file copies of the W-2 with the state and city.

ATTENTION PUA CLAIMANTS: If you are a PUA claimant, watch your dashboard for a request to use a program called ID.me." This will release your frozen (in progress) benefits. ID.me is not a scam! You can verify your identity in several minutes. Your benefits should be released in the days following your verification. Use ID.me even if you have uploaded identity documents before!

Do You Know the IRS has a Taxpayer Bill of Rights? The Taxpayer Bill of Rights (TBOR) was passed into law in 1988 by Congress to ensure the IRS doesn’t abuse its power when administering our country’s federal tax laws. These rights apply whether or not you are a citizen and even if you owe money. In the following weeks and months, we are going to be looking more closely at how Philadelphia taxpayers can use the TBOR when dealing with the IRS.... You can read more about the TBOR in IRS Publication 1 (https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p1.pdf) and on the IRS’s and the Taxpayer Advocate Service’s websites (https://www.irs.gov/taxpayer-bill-of-rights) & https://taxpayeradvocate.irs.gov/taxpayer-rights. If you think that the IRS has violated any of these rights, we would like to help you! Call 215-981-3800 from 9:30 a.m. to 12 p.m. for free legal help. Follow #TaxpayerBillofRights and #TaxTipTuesday to learn more!

REMINDER: Join us TOMORROW, January 5th at 11am. PLA Attorneys Julia Simon-Mishel and Omeed Firouzi will be live on our Facebook page discussing unemployment benefits, direct payments, and changes to your taxes. They will also do a brief Q&A at the end of the presentation. Tune in LIVE on our Facebook page or catch the recording after.

**Governor Wolf issues an emergency order -- CARES Assistance for renters and homeowners has been reopened until NOVEMBER 4, 2020** Governor Tom Wolf today issued an emergency order suspending the statutory deadline provision in the COVID Relief-Mortgage and Rental Assistance Grant Program. The CARES assistance programs for Pennsylvania renters and homeowners have been REOPENED and will be accepting applications until Nov. 4. All eligibility requirements remain the same as th...ey were when the programs ended on Sept. 30. PHFA will continue processing applications submitted prior to Oct. 1, and new applications will be added to the pool of submissions undergoing review. The governor's order is available at: https://www.phfa.org//mortgage-rental-assistance-program-o Renters and homeowners who were financially impacted by the economic slowdown related to the coronavirus pandemic can once again apply for assistance. For mortgage assistance, please visit: www.PHFA.org. Homeowners can immediately access applications. For rental assistance please visit: https://phlrentassist.org/. The portal will re-open later today. For application support, Philadelphians can call the Save Your Home Philly hotline at Philadelphia Legal Assistance at 215-334-4663. Hotline staff are available to support Philadelphians with their application, refer them to a housing counselor, and connect eligible callers them with free legal help.

The COVID-19 pandemic and economic crisis is reinforcing the importance of our state unemployment insurance systemsand how necessary it is to modernize them. A new report from the National Employment Law Project, Philadelphia Legal Assistance, and The Century Foundation lays out how states can ensure UI modernization efforts are equitable and effective: https://philalegal.org/BenMod

If your unemployment compensation benefits are expiring soon or have already expired, you are eligible for additional benefits! The Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation (PEUC) and Extended Benefits (EB) programs can provide up to 26 weeks of additional benefits. Once you exhaust your unemployment compensation benefits, you will be automatically enrolled in PEUC and then EB, but you will need to continue filing biweekly claims.

! i vi tt c nhng ngi np n xin tr cp tht nghip thng xuyên, tr cp tht nghip dài hn hoc tr cp tht nghip i dch, iu này là dành cho bn! --------------------------------------------------------------------------------... For all claimants on regular unemployment benefits, extended unemployment benefits, or Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, this is for you! Last Friday the Department announced the beginning of the Lost Wage Assistance program, which provides a $300 supplement for unemployment benefits. Unfortunately, the benefit is only available for 6 weeks -- the weeks ending August 1 through September 5. For most claimants who have been continuously filing claims, you will receive a lump sum of $1800 for LWA (or $1620 with taxes withheld). If you have not yet filed for those weeks, you will get LWA a week after you get your regular benefits (for UC) or the same time you get your regular benefits (for PUA). Claimants on a regular UC program MUST GO ONLINE AND CERTIFY for the program. The certification involves two questions. It is NOT available though the automated telephone system, you must do it online or mail in a paper form (https://www.uc.pa.gov//file/Docu/UC-201(IN)%20%2009-20.pdf). If you have stopped filing biweekly claims because you are back at work, but you were unemployed due to the disruptions caused by COVID19 for any of the weeks at issue, you should go into the system and file the certification. PUA claimants do not need to certify because you certify weekly that you are unemployed due to COVID19.

We are thrilled to announce that AL DÍA’s Top Lawyers Forum has recognized PLA Executive Director, Anita Santos-Singh, and Board of Directors member, Renee Garcia, as leaders inspiring the next generation of Latinx lawyers. Congratulations Anita and Renee! We are thankful for your leadership.

In this Facebook Live session, PLA Attorney Omeed Firouzi explained the federal tax consequences of being misclassified as an independent contractor. Questions? Ask him in the comments!

Tune into our Facebook Live TODAY, September 17th at 12 p.m. to hear from PLA Attorney Omeed Firouzi. Omeed will discuss the federal tax consequences of misclassification and how workers can challenge their misclassification before the IRS!

Para todos los solicitantes de beneficios de desempleo regulares (UC), Beneficios de Desempleo Extendidos (PEUC o EB) o Asistencia por Desempleo Pandémico (PUA), ¡esto es para usted! El viernes pasado, el Departamento anunció el inicio del programa de Asistencia para Salarios Perdidos (LWA), que proporciona un suplemento de $300 por beneficios de desempleo. Desafortunadamente, el beneficio solo está disponible por 6 semanas, las semanas que terminan el 1 de agosto hasta el 5 ...de Septiembre. Para la mayoría de los reclamantes que han estado presentando reclamos continuamente, recibirá una suma de $ 1800 por LWA (o $ 1620 con impuestos retenidos). Si aún no ha presentado la solicitud para esas semanas, recibirá LWA una semana después de recibir sus beneficios regulares (para UC) o al mismo tiempo que reciba sus beneficios regulares (para PUA). Los reclamantes en el programa UC regular DEBEN CONECTARSE EN LÍNEA Y CERTIFICARSE para el programa. La certificación implica dos preguntas. NO está disponible a través del sistema telefónico automatizado, debe hacerlo en línea o por correo en un formulario en papel (https://www.uc.pa.gov//file/Docu/UC-201(IN)%20%2009-20.pdf). Si dejó de presentar reclamaciones quincenales porque volvió al trabajo, pero estuvo desempleado debido a las interrupciones causadas por COVID19 durante cualquiera de las semanas en cuestión, debe ingresar al sistema y presentar la certificación. Los solicitantes de PUA no necesitan certificar porque usted certifica semanalmente que está desempleado debido a COVID19.

If you are a worker "misclassified" as an independent contractor when you are really an employee, you may be paying more in taxes than you should and losing out on key benefits. Workers should know the federal tax consequences of misclassification and how they can challenge their misclassification before the IRS! Tune into our Facebook Live next Thursday, September 17th at 12 p.m. to hear from PLA Attorney Omeed Firouzi.

For all claimants on regular unemployment benefits, extended unemployment benefits, or Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, this is for you! Last Friday the Department announced the beginning of the Lost Wage Assistance program, which provides a $300 supplement for unemployment benefits. Unfortunately, the benefit is only available for 6 weeks -- the weeks ending August 1 through September 5. For most claimants who have been continuously filing claims, you will receive a lump ...sum of $1800 for LWA (or $1620 with taxes withheld). If you have not yet filed for those weeks, you will get LWA a week after you get your regular benefits (for UC) or the same time you get your regular benefits (for PUA). Claimants on a regular UC program MUST GO ONLINE AND CERTIFY for the program. The certification involves two questions. It is NOT available though the automated telephone system, you must do it online or mail in a paper form (https://www.uc.pa.gov//file/Docu/UC-201(IN)%20%2009-20.pdf). If you have stopped filing biweekly claims because you are back at work, but you were unemployed due to the disruptions caused by COVID19 for any of the weeks at issue, you should go into the system and file the certification. PUA claimants do not need to certify because you certify weekly that you are unemployed due to COVID19.