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Film staff who’ve been unemployed throughout the strike will get some assist in sustaining their medical health insurance, the business plan introduced Monday.

The Motion Picture Industry Pension and Health Plans will lengthen eligibility to sure contributors who in any other case wouldn’t have sufficient hours to qualify for advantages.

The MPIPHP additionally introduced that members will be capable to take a one-time “hardship withdrawal” from their defined-contributed retirement plans. The withdrawal cap is 20% of the stability, as much as $20,000.

The business plans took comparable steps throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, when staff have been additionally unable to work sufficient hours to fulfill the everyday eligibility thresholds.

The MPIPHP funds have been affected by the strike, in keeping with Mike Miller, vp in command of the West Coast workplace of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees. Members recorded 18 million fewer hours of labor via mid-July, in comparison with the identical interval in 2022, which interprets to a drop of greater than $200 million in contributions, Miller mentioned.

Ordinarily, contributors should work 400 hours in a six-month interval to qualify for medical health insurance. Members whose qualifying interval expired on July 22 will probably be credited as much as 201 hours to achieve that threshold.

The plans additionally elected to credit score extra hours for staff whose intervals ended on June 24 and May 20. Those staff will obtain as much as 134 and 67 hours, respectively.

“MPIHP is in the process of identifying eligible participants and implementing the credit/grant of hours,” the plan CEO, David Asplund, mentioned in a message to union enterprise brokers on Monday. “Participants who are eligible will receive a letter informing them of the hours that have been credited/granted.”

In order to qualify for the grant of hours, members should have been actively enrolled previous to the present profit interval.

The Writers Guild of America strike started on May 2, shuttering most TV manufacturing and a few movie manufacturing. The SAG-AFTRA strike adopted on July 14, shutting down all remaining scripted manufacturing, except for about 100 indie tasks.

The Entertainment Community Fund and the Motion Picture & Television Fund have been concerned in serving to members who’ve already misplaced well being protection. Members have been directed to COBRA and the Covered California plans.