The federal government has passed the CARES Act, a $2 trillion economic relief plan that will offer Disaster Unemployment Assistance to tens of millions of households affected by the coronavirus pandemic. It includes workers in the gig economy. Your base benefit is based on the state formula, which in NY is around 50% your pay, based on how much you earned in your highest quarter out of the last five quarters. State benefits will be paid for 26 weeks. With Federal Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, eligible workers will get an extra $600 per week on top of current levels of unemployment benefits for up to four months (Until July 31, 2020), and extend state benefits for another 13 weeks if you are still unemployed or underemployed after 26 weeks. There is more information about the federal expansion of unemployment here: https://labor.ny.gov/ui/cares-act.shtm.
According to the NY State Department of Labor, to apply for Disaster Unemployment Assistance, you will need to apply for state Unemployment Insurance Benefits first.
The day you should file is based on the first letter of your last name. Last names starting with A – F, file on Monday. Last names starting with G – N, file on Tuesday. Last names starting with O – Z, file on Wednesday. If you missed your filing day, file on Thursday, Friday or Saturday. Filing later in the week will not delay your payments or affect the date of your claim; all claims are effective on the Monday of the week in which they are filed.
You may file your claim:
Monday – Thursday from 7:30 am to 7:30 pm (Eastern Time)
Friday from 7:30 am to 5:00 pm
Saturday – all-day
Sunday until 7 pm
Phone Service Call our Telephone Claim Center, toll-free during business hours to file a claim.
1-888-209-8124
We are extending telephone filing hours as follows:
Monday through Thursday, 8 am to 7:30 pm.
Friday, 8:00 am to 6:00 pm.
Saturday, 7:30 am to 8:00 pm.
If you file by phone, we offer translation services. Use your phone keypad to enter the number for the language you choose. A voice recording will offer you these choices:
English
Spanish
Russian
Cantonese
Mandarin
Creole
Korean
Polish
All other languages
Things you need to file your claim:
Your Social Security number
Your driver license or Motor Vehicle ID card number (if you have either one)
Your complete mailing address and zip code
A phone number where we can reach you from 8 am – 5 pm, Monday –Friday
Your Alien Registration card number (if you are not a U.S. Citizen and have a card)
Names and addresses of all your employers for the last 18 months, including those in other states
Employer Registration number or Federal Employer Identification Number (FEIN) of your most recent employer (FEIN is on your W-2 forms)
Your copies of forms SF8 and SF50, if you were a federal employee
Your most recent separation form (DD 214), for military service
Bank account number
1099 forms from both companies
After submitting the form, you will have to activate the application by calling the hotline number.
Ride-Hail Apps are Putting NYC At Risk By Failing to Promote Driver Screenings and Provide Answers on Driver Sick Pay
Uber, Lyft Drivers Call for City, Apps to Promote COVID-19 Screening for Drivers, Demand Answers on Sick Pay
New York, NY — In light of the federal government’s failure to stop the spread of COVID-19, the Independent Drivers Guild is calling for New York City and ride-hail apps Uber, Lyft and Via to promote free telemedicine screenings for New York drivers. The IDG is also demanding answers on the sick pay the apps have promised.
“The best-intentioned traveler with COVID-19 must get home to self-quarantine. But first, they need to get home, and Uber, Lyft and Via drivers are the way they often do that. We know drivers will get sick, Uber, Lyft and Via must work with us to ensure these drivers have the ability to stay home,” said Brendan Sexton, Executive Director of Independent Drivers Guild.
The Center for Disease Control has recommended telemedicine amid the COVID-19 pandemic as a way to screen patients without putting others at risk. The Independent Drivers Guild advocated for and won a free telemedicine benefit for New York’s ride-hail and black car drivers in 2018 through the state’s Black Car Fund. However, Uber, Lyft, and Via have thus far failed to include an in-app button for drivers to access this critical benefit and they all must do more to promote screenings. Via has failed to promote the free telemedicine screenings at all despite the fact that their drivers may be most at risk because their trips are largely pooled rides, often packing six riders in a van.
Uber, Lyft and Via have all promised compensation for drivers who become infected with COVID-19 or are directed to quarantine, but they have provided no path to that compensation. IDG has built that path, but we need Uber, Lyft, and Via as partners. We also need Uber, Lyft and Via to provide detail on their sick pay plans, like how to submit a doctor’s order to self-quarantine, how to receive compensation and how much drivers will be paid.
The Independent Drivers Guild is also urging the city’s Taxi and Limousine Commission to promote the free telemedicine screenings to drivers as well as providing handwashing stations with parking for TLC drivers and establishing a written policy that TLC drivers will not be billed for visiting city hospitals and clinics for visits concerning COVID-19 symptoms, consistent with recent remarks that those who cannot afford testing can be tested for free. The Guild met with the TLC on these issues last week and followed up with a memo to the city and app companies earlier this week.
The Independent Drivers Guild takes the health of professional drivers seriously and the Guild’s organizing wins are helping in the fight to stop the spread of COVID-19. In addition to the telemedicine benefit, the IDG successfully advocated for and secured running water restrooms for ride-hail drivers at JFK, La Guardia and Newark airports for the very first time beginning this past fall, providing critically needed handwashing facilities. The IDG also advocated for and secured free flu shots for New York’s ride-hail and black car drivers, with this being the second year providing free inoculations. Now with the spread of COVID-19, the IDG is working again to protect the health of drivers, riders and the community. Media Contact: press@drivingguild.org
Albany, NY — The Independent Drivers Guild (IDG), which advocates for more than 80,000 ride-hail drivers in New York, is calling for New York legislators to pass right to bargain legislation in testimony before the New York State Assembly Standing Committee on Labor today.
The Drivers Guild called for New York State leaders to give drivers the right to collective and sectoral bargaining at a State Senate hearing in October and this week, New York State Senator Savino, who convened the hearing, announced that she will introduce legislation in January that will give drivers the right to bargain.
“We would like to thank the Committee for holding a public hearing on key issues we are facing in a new era of work in America and New York State. New York has always been a labor leader, and today, we have an opportunity to make real change and give 120,000 drivers in New York State a real voice, real power and a real chance at attaining collective bargaining rights. None of that can happen in the current state or with the current labor laws at the federal level,” said Sexton. “Today, too many workers have no voice. As the rich get richer, workers wages remain stagnant. We are calling on New York State to pass legislation giving ride-hail drivers the right to unionize with collective sectoral bargaining agreements. If New York passes a right to bargain law, we will be blazing a trail for growing our unionized workforce and the largest organizing gains in the history of New York State.”
The Independent Drivers Guild successfully organized to win the nation’s first minimum pay rate protection for New York City’s app-based drivers (at $27.86 per hour) as well as landmark benefits and a law requiring Uber to offer a tipping option in the app. The Guild’s organizing wins have put over $1 billion in drivers’ pockets. However, ride-hail companies continue to dramatically change the terms of drivers’ working conditions at any time and only collective or sectoral bargaining rights will empower drivers to finally end this exploitation.
“We want a bargaining agreement that lets us work when we want and would stop the apps from making massive unilateral changes to our livelihoods,” added Aziz Bah, a driver for Uber and Lyft who is also an IDG organizer.
Independent Drivers Guild Led Massive Protest Caravan Over Brooklyn Bridge, Up to Gracie Mansion, and to Uber Headquarters
New York, NY — On Tuesday morning thousands of Uber and Lyft drivers with the Independent Drivers Guild led a slow vehicle procession over the Brooklyn Bridge and up to Gracie Mansion to call for the Mayor and City Council’s help in response to new app changes from Uber and Lyft in New York City that will harm drivers’ ability to make a living. Drivers who were able to park did so and rallied outside Gracie mansion. The caravan then continued on to Uber Headquarters in Manhattan where many drivers parked and protested outside the Uber office and others circled the block honking.
Approximately 6,000 drivers participated in the action which slowed rush hour traffic to a near stand still in a procession that stretched across the city at times covering the full length from the Brooklyn Bridge up FDR Drive to Gracie Mansion.
Starting on Tuesday Uber launched new policies to kick drivers off the apps between trips and in areas of lower demand in order to avoid paying drivers as required by New York City’s pay regulations. Lyft enacted a similar policy earlier this summer to protests from the Drivers Guild. The New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission has failed to take action, so the Drivers Guild is calling for the Mayor and City Council to stop the apps from violating the pay rules in an attempt to scam drivers out of fair pay and top pass a Drivers’ Bill of Rights. The Guild, a Machinists Union affiliate representing and advocating for New York’s 80,000 app-based drivers, led a two year campaign to win the nation’s first minimum pay rate for Uber and Lyft drivers. Rules which the apps are now violating.
“Uber and Lyft are flouting New York City’s driver pay rules to avoid paying drivers what they have earned and the city’s Taxi and Limousine Commission has done nothing to stop them. Today drivers are saying: We will not be ignored. We are calling on the Mayor and City Council to step in and help us fight back against the app companies. More than 1,000 Uber and Lyft drivers logged off the apps to take part in a procession over the Brooklyn Bridge and through Manhattan to Gracie Mansion today to protest the app companies and demand action from the city,” said Brendan Sexton, Executive Director of the IDG, a Machinists Union affiliate which represents and advocates for more than 80,000 app based drivers in NYC. “For months we warned that if the city failed to take enforcement action against Lyft for violating the pay rules, that the other apps would follow suit and drivers’ pay would suffer. Already thousands of drivers are struggling to pay their bills because Lyft is blocking them from the app. Now with Uber following suit more than 80,000 New York City families will pay the price if the city refuses to stand up for drivers and crackdown on the app companies.”
Council Member Brad Lander who sponsored the law requiring a minimum pay rate for Uber and Lyft drivers has also spoken out against the app companies’ actions and voiced his support for the drivers today.
“Kicking drivers off the app between rides and controlling where and when drivers can work directly undermines Uber and Lyft’s pretense of employing independent contractors who set their own hours. Far from providing flexible work schedules and a solution to transit deserts, Uber and Lyft are forcing drivers to avoid serving low-income outer boroughs and limiting their ability to make a living wage, in violation of the spirit of NYC Council’s ground-breaking legislation to guarantee for-hire drivers a minimum hourly wage. These are the same companies that have been arguing that they don’t control their drivers’ work and it isn’t central to their business model. Uber and Lyft can’t have it both ways. Either recognize drivers as employees entitled to minimum wage, overtime pay, health insurance and all the rights that entails, or follow the law we passed to ensure that drivers make a fair wage,” said Councilmember Brad Lander.
Today’s protest shows growing driver anger at the app companies and the city’s failure to protect driver pay. Just last week more than 100 IDG members gathered at CIty Hall to call for the city to abolish the TLC due to its failure to stand up for drivers, including on this issue of enforcing the pay rules. The Guild also called for the city to pass a Drivers’ Bill of Rights, which specifically included blocking apps from trying to get around the pay rules.
Further Background:
For months Lyft has been kicking New York City drivers off the app to avoid paying them and the Independent Drivers Guild has been calling on the city to take aggressive enforcement action, warning that without enforcement other apps may follow suit. On Friday, just days after more than 100 IDG members rallied at City Hall calling for action, Uber announced in an email to drivers that it would indeed begin the same practice to flout the city’s pay rules on Tuesday.
In June, the Guild wrote a letter to the City’s Taxi and Limousine Commission calling for enforcement on this issue and drivers testified to this issue in July calling attention to the fact that Lyft was using this policy to further enrich the company by giving preferential access to drivers who pay them upwards of $400 per week to rent a vehicle from Lyft’s Express Drive program. However, the city’s Taxi and Limousine Commission failed to act and failed to include any further regulatory guidance during its summer rulemaking, despite having the clear opportunity to do so.
After 2 years of organizing, the TLC will finally vote on raising driver pay, introducing dead head pay, and enforcing pay transparency on Tuesday, December 4th. We need YOUR support!
We will be gathering at 8:30 AM outside 33 Beaver Street New York, NY to show power at the 10:00 AM meeting and demand that the TLC raise driver pay to what we deserve. Without you, we cannot win.
Come to the next IDG general meeting and learn about the next steps in our fight for a fair industry. We will go over important new developments, potential harmful proposals at the TLC that would hurt our drivers, the launch of free IDG Benefits, and our actions in the upcoming year.
Please join us at this important meeting on Tuesday, December 4th at 7PM. We need YOUR support! Free parking opens up at 7PM and there will be food available, as always!