Officer/Shareholder Unemployment Benefits

[ICOUNT]

These are tough times. I had a client called re: He is president & sole shareholder of his Corp if he could lay himself off and draw unemployment benefits. Officer shareholders do pay unemployment on the compensation for state purposes as I recall because Federal requires it. Has anyone have clients if this situation that have successfully drawn unemployment?

Thanks for any enlightment

[GeneInAlabama]

Years ago, I saw a construction company that was a C corp where the officers filed for unemployment and got it during the time when they had no work.

[ACS41]

I have an S corp client (Florida) who filed for unemployment he had zero revenue coming in due to his contract expired. I went throuh the unemployment application and if taken literally, he is elligible. If you pay into the syatem, at some point you may need to file a claim.

[JohnH]

The should be no problem if they qualify.

I've seen this done a couple of times over the years.

The Employment Security Commission people might ask a few more questions or raise the bar a little in terms of having them prove there is no work available, but they must allow the claimant to receive benefits if they deserve them. And in the current environment, I suspect there will be even less questions asked.