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Millions of dollars in fraudulent unemployment claims submitted in West Virginia


The Eyewitness News iTeam has learned that thousands of fraudulent unemployment claims have been submitted in West Virginia. (Sinclair Broadcast Group)
The Eyewitness News iTeam has learned that thousands of fraudulent unemployment claims have been submitted in West Virginia. (Sinclair Broadcast Group)
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The Eyewitness News iTeam has learned that millions of dollars in fraudulent unemployment claims were made just this week in West Virginia.

WorkForce West Virginia made the discovery, and it’s happening across the country. The fraud involves pandemic unemployment assistance claims, which are the ones filed by independent contractors and the self-employed.

In the last week of April, when pandemic unemployment assistance claims were first accepted, WorkForce West Virginia received 14,265 applications. For the entire month of May, pandemic unemployment assistance claims totaled 19,282.

During the first four days of June, Workforce West Virginia received 19,621 claims – more than the entire month of May. It was the red flag that tipped off WorkForce West Virginia that something was wrong.

Investigating those claims, WorkForce thinks that 90% to 93% of the June applications are fraudulent.

Officials think about 19,000 claims are fake. If those claims had been processed, it would have cost taxpayers $14.4 million for a single week of payments.

WorkForce has been checking all of its pandemic unemployment assistance claims since discovering the fraud attempts.

Of those made in the first three weeks of the program, only 3% to 4% are suspected to be fraudulent.

Interim Commissioner Scott Adkins said his investigators are applying more than two dozen filters to claims and finding duplicate bank router numbers, addresses, names and more which indicate the application is fake.

Adkins said besides the attempted theft, the worst part of this situation is that people who legitimately qualify and need the money will now experience even more delays as each claim is individually checked.

The agency is working with federal authorities on the suspected cases of fraud Adkins said. He said they have found applications for West Virginia unemployment benefits filed from every state in the nation.

Additionally, he said a local resident has allegedly filed 62 fake claims.

Starting with June 1 applications, WorkForce West Virginia will require pandemic unemployment assistance claims to be accompanied by some type of identification.

Any benefits paid out will be disbursed by paper check or put into a Key Bank debit card. Key Bank is WorkForce West Virginia's vendor for the program.

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