On March 16, 2020, Governor Tim Walz signed Executive Order 20-05 that suspends some of the usual rules regarding eligibility for unemployment benefits. To start with, the normal rule that all recipients of unemployment benefits wait one week before receiving any benefits is waived until December 31, 2020. Importantly, unemployment benefits are now available for any employee who is not able to work (or whose hours have been reduced) because of COVID-19. Some examples of situations that would result in an employee’s eligibility for unemployment include the following: 1) A determination by a health care professional that the presence of the employee in the workplace would jeopardize the health of others (whether or not the employee tested positive for COVID-19); 2) The employee is under an order from the government to self-quarantine; 3) A health care professional has recommended that the employee self-quarantine; 4) The employer has ordered employees not to come to work because of COVID-19; 5) The employee has lost child care because of school or daycare closings and is unable to find alternative child care, has no paid time off and cannot reach a reasonable accommodation with the employer to continue working.
The governor’s order also protects employers from sky-rocketing unemployment insurance rates by ordering that any unemployment compensation benefits paid to employees because of the COVID-19 crisis will not affect the employer’s unemployment insurance tax rate.