DCL-98-118, Interstate Unemployment Insurance (UI) Withholding Requests

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
Administration for Children & Families
Office of Child Support Enforcement

DCL-98-118 NOV 10, 1998

TO: ALL IV-D DIRECTORS

RE: Interstate Unemployment Insurance (UI) Withholding Requests

Dear Colleague:

Based on State requests made during our March OCSE conferences we have contacted the various State Employment Security Agencies (SESAs) to determine how they handle interstate unemployment insurance (UI) intercept requests. While SESAs must process interstate UI intercept requests, they are required to be reimbursed under sec. 303(e)(2)(c) of the Social Security Act and need not accept interstate UI intercepts until a fee agreement is in place. Attached is a chart that displays the administrative reaction of the 53 SESAs to the receipt of out-of-State requests for the intercept (withholding) of UI benefits for child support. OCSE will be issuing further guidance to States in the near future.

In summary, there are three SESA administrative actions that could possibly be taken:

Return the request to the out-of-State agency. Ten of the SESAs do this, either with the notation that all such requests should be routed through their IV-D agency, or informing them that the State does not honor out-of-State requests. The ten SESAs that return the request to the requester are: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Maine, Nebraska, North Carolina, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia.
Forward the request to their own responsible State agency (usually their IV-D agency). This process generally is followed because the SESA has in place an agreement with their own IV-D agency for the reimbursement of administrative costs. Thirty-two SESAs do this, with one other SESA (Georgia) in the middle of trying to resolve handling procedures with their IV-D agency. The IV-D (or other responsible) agency either processes the claim itself (when it has access to the SESA database), or returns it to the SESA for them to process (at which point the SESA usually cannot distinguish whether the request originated in-State or out-of-State).
Process it themselves and forward the funds to the out-of-State requester (either directly or through their own IV-D agency). Ten (10) SESAs do this: Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. There are other SESAs having discussions on how best to implement this option.

If you need any clarification as to the information contained in this chart, please contact Christine Jennings at (703) 352-3855 or via email at christine.jennings@trw.com. Additionally, we are planning to incorporate this information into the Interstate Referral Guide (IRG).

Sincerely,

David Gray Ross
Commissioner
Office of Child Support Enforcement

Attachment

cc: Regional Program Managers
FCR Programmatic Contacts

SESA Chart Display on Intercepting Out-of-State UI benefits for child support. (28K M.S. Word Document)