INDIANAPOLIS (Network Indiana) — Friday’s press conference was supposed to bring clarity to a growing issue. Instead, it may have caused more confusion and frustration.
That’s according to Lin Moreau, owner of the Eyelash Place. On Friday, the Department of Workforce Development held a press conference to clear up any misunderstandings or miscommunications regarding the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program. The DWD also covered statewide unemployment benefits, and when Hoosiers could start seeing those payment again.
But for Moreau, her concern was the $10,000 bill from the DWD. She tells our news gathering partners at WISH-TV that she never received that much money from the state during the pandemic. She says she’s provided proof of her employment in the form of an appeal, but has been denied. Now, she’s on a payment plan – over $400 a month to the state.
Moreau claims she has provided the state with a decade’s worth of tax information that proves her employment. She’s employed now. But now she’s receiving the $300 unemployment benefit paycheck.
She says it’s just another layer of confusion.
“They’re obviously mistaken or they’re doing something wrong,” Moreau told WISH-TV, “I’m in shock. I can’t believe they can send out $10,000 bills to people who didn’t even get 10,000.”
DWD Commissioner Fred Payne said in Friday’s conference that Hoosiers can appeal or apply for a waiver if they feel their bill isn’t correct, but that each case would be handled on a fact-by-fact basis.
But Moreau tells WISH-TV that the whole process of waivers and appeals shouldn’t fall on Hoosiers. It should be on the DWD to correct their mistake.
“It shouldn’t be on us,” Moreau explains, “It should be on them to do the right thing, to make it easy.”
