Can You Collect Unemployment If Fired in Pennsylvania?

Yes, you can collect unemployment if you were fired in Pennsylvania, unless your employer can prove you were fired for what the state calls “willful misconduct.” Being terminated is not itself a disqualifier. Poor performance, a bad fit, honest mistakes, and reasons outside your control generally still allow you to receive benefits, provided you meet Pennsylvania’s earnings requirements.

What Willful Misconduct Means

Pennsylvania uses “willful misconduct” as the legal standard for denying benefits to fired workers. It covers intentional disregard of an employer’s interests, deliberate rule-breaking, or behavior that falls well below what any employer could reasonably expect. It also includes negligence so severe that it shows wrongful intent or a real disregard for your job duties.¹ The word doing the work is “intentional.” A costly mistake is not the same as deliberately ignoring what you know you should be doing.

Your former employer carries the burden of proof. They must show the unemployment office that your conduct rose to the level of willful misconduct.¹ This matters more than most people realize. Employers who fire someone for vague “performance issues” and then can’t articulate exactly what happened often lose the claim by default.

Firings That Will Disqualify You

Certain conduct almost always counts as willful misconduct and will result in a denial. These involve deliberate choices, not slip-ups:

Theft or dishonesty, such as stealing company property or falsifying records.
Being under the influence of drugs or alcohol at work, or failing a lawful drug or alcohol test.¹
Repeated unexcused absences after warnings. In some cases, a single absence can be enough if the circumstances are egregious.¹
Breaking a known, reasonable company policy without good cause.
Insubordination, meaning refusing a reasonable directive from a supervisor.

For attendance-based firings, the employer generally has to show they warned you first. A termination for absences where you were never told your job was at risk is harder to defend as willful misconduct.²

Firings That Usually Still Allow Benefits

If you were fired because you simply couldn’t do the job well enough, you can typically still collect. Unsatisfactory work performance is not willful misconduct when you were genuinely trying.¹ That covers lacking the skills or aptitude the position required, missing production targets despite honest effort, or being a poor fit for the role.

Isolated mistakes, honest errors in judgment, and ordinary negligence also fall short of the standard. Accidentally damaging company equipment, for instance, is generally not grounds for disqualification.²

The Good Cause Defense

Even if your employer can show you broke a workplace rule, you may still qualify if you had “good cause” for doing so. For a rule violation to count as willful misconduct, the employer must prove the rule existed, was reasonable, and that you broke it without justification. If the employer’s demand was unreasonable or you had a legitimate reason for not complying, you should have communicated that reason to your employer at the time. An absence due to illness, for example, is good cause and generally not willful misconduct.

This defense comes up often in disputes over overtime refusals, attendance, and situations where an employee felt unsafe following a directive. Breaking a rule is not automatically disqualifying if the rule itself was unreasonable or your circumstances justified the violation.

You Still Have to Meet the Earnings Test

Clearing the willful misconduct hurdle is only half of it. You must also meet Pennsylvania’s financial eligibility standards, based on your earnings during a “base year,” which is the first four of the last five completed calendar quarters before you file.¹

Credit weeks: you must have earned at least $116 in at least 18 separate calendar weeks during your base year.¹
Wages in at least two of the four base year quarters.
Wage distribution: at least 37% of your total base year wages must have been earned outside your single highest-earning quarter.¹

The wage distribution rule catches people who worked a short stint at high pay. If nearly all your base year earnings came from one quarter, you won’t qualify even though the total looks sufficient. Pennsylvania offers an alternate base year for people who can’t meet these requirements because of a work-related injury compensable under Workers’ Compensation, using the four quarters immediately before the injury.¹

How Severance Affects Your Claim

Severance pay does not necessarily block you from receiving unemployment, but it can reduce or delay your payments. Only the portion of your severance that exceeds 40% of the state’s average annual wage is deductible from your benefits. For benefit years beginning in 2026, that 40% threshold is $28,153.63. Any severance above that amount is allocated week by week against your benefits based on your full-time weekly wage.³

File your claim immediately regardless of severance. Your benefit year clock starts whether or not you are receiving payments right away.

How to File

You can file an initial claim with the Pennsylvania Department of Labor & Industry online through the state’s UC website at any hour, or by calling 1-888-313-7284 Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. You’ll need your Social Security number, details about your former employer, and your dates of employment. Claims are effective the week you apply, and your benefit year runs 52 weeks from that point.⁴

The first week you are unemployed and otherwise eligible is a “waiting week.” No benefits are paid for that week, but you must still file a certification for it. Benefits become payable starting the second eligible week.⁴

After the initial claim, you must submit a weekly certification for every week you want benefits. Miss a week and you don’t get paid for it.⁴ Pennsylvania also requires an active work search: each week you must apply for at least two jobs and complete one additional work search activity, such as attending a job fair, using PA CareerLink, uploading a resume, working with an employment agency, or taking a pre-employment test.⁵ Keep a log. The state can audit your records at any time.

What to Do If You’re Denied

A denial is not the end. Many initial denials get overturned on appeal, especially when the employer’s evidence is thin or you didn’t get a full chance to explain your side. You have 21 calendar days from the determination date to file an appeal. If the 21st day falls on a weekend or state holiday, the deadline extends to the next business day.⁶

Appeals can be filed online through your UC account, by mail, by fax, by email at UCAppeals@pa.gov, or in person at a PA CareerLink office.⁶ The appeal goes to a UC Referee who will schedule a hearing. Both sides can present testimony under oath, bring witnesses, and submit documents such as emails, written warnings, or attendance records. Firsthand witnesses who directly observed the events carry more weight than secondhand accounts.

Pennsylvania’s appeals process has three levels:

UC Referee: the first appeal, filed within 21 days of the initial determination.
UC Board of Review: if the Referee rules against you, you have 21 days to appeal to the Board.
Commonwealth Court: a final appeal from the Board of Review must be filed within 30 days.⁷

Don’t let the 21-day window pass. Missing it is the single most common way people forfeit a winnable appeal. The Referee has discretion over whether to accept a late filing, and that is a gamble worth avoiding.

1
Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry. Eligibility Information
2
Pennsylvania. Unemployment Compensation Eligibility Issues
3
Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry. Severance Pension Pay Deductions FAQs
4
Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Apply for Unemployment Compensation Benefits
5
Department of Labor and Industry. Work Search
6
Department of Labor and Industry. Appealing a Determination to a UC Referee
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Department of Labor and Industry. UC Benefit Appeals