ROCHESTER, N.Y. – More than four years after the pandemic began, New York State is still trying to claw back billions of your tax dollars that it sent to unemployment scammers. But as News10NBC Investigative Reporter Jennifer Lewke discovered, some of that cash is hiding in plain sight.
Lisa Sherman was never unemployed during the pandemic but the New York State Department of Labor approved an unemployment claim in her name at the time. As soon as she found out, she flagged it as fraud. “I filed a fraudulent claim report online, I also locked down my credit, I did all that and then a month later… I get a KeyBank card that has money on it,” Sherman recalls.
So, she contacted the state again and Key Bank. “I cancelled the card, I said please cancel the card, don’t put any money on it, send the money back to NYS unemployment please and filed a police report and I thought it was all done, I never heard anything again,” Sherman says.
That is, until now, more than four years later. “So, I think everything is okay until last week, I get a letter from Key Bank stating there is over $4,500 on the card and that I need to claim it before the end of August or it’s going to go back to what they call an escheatment which means it goes to the office of unclaimed funds,” Sherman says.
She got right back on the phone with Key Bank. “She said, oh, don’t worry about it, it’s just going to go back to the state. And I was like, but it’s going back to the wrong department. Office of unclaimed fund still stays in my name,” Sherman says.
As News10NBC reported back in 2020 and 2021, thousands of people got these Key Bank cards in the mail who never actually filed for unemployment. “How many other people is this happening to who may not realize that when they get this letter, it’s not their money,” Sherman wonders.
She went around and around with the state DOL trying to get this cleared up but she can’t get through to anyone for help.
In a statement, a spokesperson tells News10NBC, “NYSDOL understands the importance of recovering every dollar possible that was fraudulently claimed during the COVID-19 crisis and is working each and every day to do so. NYSDOL is actively engaged with both KeyBank and the Comptroller’s Office to recover fraudulent funds.”
The DOL says its policy at the time was to notify Key Bank within 24 hours when a claim was flagged as fraud and Key Bank has returned hundreds of millions of dollars to DOL to date. But clearly, some of that money has still slipped through the cracks.
Anyone who received a fraudulent Key Bank card during or immediately following the pandemic, should keep an eye out for any communication from Key Bank and contact the financial institution and the Department of Labor right away if the money is still active in the account.
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