Tennessee starts sending $600 unemployment payments

Tennessee has started paying approved unemployment claimants their first installment of the $600 Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (FPUC) benefit, in addition to their Tennessee Unemployment Compensation (TUC) benefit, according to a release from the state.

According to a release, Tennessee distributed close to $94 million for approximately 110,000 unemployed residents. The state said most claimants will receive their money by Wednesday via direct deposit.

The release said the number of payments is expected to increase and will likely exceed 150,000.

"During the entire previous week, the state sent 114,000 claimants more than $33 million in unemployment benefits. That week did not include the FPUC payment," the release said.

"The federal CARES Act provides FPUC to all approved claimants currently receiving unemployment benefits. The federal government considers both TUC and FPUC benefits taxable income. Claimants can choose to have those taxes automatically deducted or to pay them at a later date," it continued.

The state said it will provide retroactive pay to March 29 in upcoming payments.

The Tennessee Department of Labor & Workforce Development temporarily shut down its 'Jobs4TN' unemployment claims website due to an unprecedented amount of users.

The site was shut down for a few hours Monday to process this week's claims and allow the system to return to normal response time.

The state said the application for self-employed individuals has not been updated yet and programmers are still working on the section.

When the state starts paying Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, the claims for self-employed individuals will be there and ready to process.