Paul McAuliffe (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail)
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520. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection when pandemic unemployment payment recipients who are due backdated payments will receive their payments; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [35029/20]

Patricia Ryan (Kildare South, Sinn Fein)
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523. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection if her attention has been drawn to the large number of pandemic unemployment payment arrears outstanding; her plans to address the situation; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [35206/20]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 520 and 523 together.

Since the introduction of the Pandemic Unemployment Payment scheme in March, approximately 806,000 people have applied for payment and in some cases, they have done so on a number of occasions as they moved in and out of employment. Consequently, there are over 1.4 million applications to be examined to determine if arrears are due.

During the month of March, my Department received and processed jobseeker claims equivalent in number to a three year claim-load. These applications were processed as quickly as possible, with almost 59,000 people paid in the first week of the scheme, 283,000 people paid in the following week, and over 507,000 people in the third week of the scheme.

My Department is keenly aware that many people are due some arrears and that every case will be different. In order to address an issue of this scale, my Department is currently developing an automated process, which will examine each case and look at their overall entitlement to payment and match this against their payment history. The work involved is complex as the Pandemic Unemployment Payment system itself evolved from a manual applications system to one where applications were submitted online and paid over two different payment platforms (one from March to July and the second from July to date).

Given the complexity attached to the project, it will take some time yet to fully complete the necessary development work to review all cases and to determine to what extent, if any, arrears are due to individuals. I can assure the Deputy that this is a priority for my Department and it is hoped to make payments before the end of the year.

I hope that this clarifies matters for the Deputies.