Jobless claims fall amid Hurricane Sandy

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Claims for unemployment benefits fell last week, as Hurricane Sandy led to power outages and closed offices on the East Coast and kept many people from filing claims.

About 355,000 people filed for first-time unemployment benefits in the week ended November 3, down 8,000 from the previous week, the Labor Department said Thursday.

That level is the lowest in a month, but it reflects data that was distorted by the storm. At least one state was not able to process claims due to power outages, a Labor Department official said.

As of Thursday morning, New Jersey's Department of Labor and Workforce Development was experiencing delays in processing claims.

"Due to Sandy and the higher than normal volume of unemployment insurance filings, the system is experiencing some delays," its website said. "Please be patient. Our technical team is working on the problem."

Claims are likely to head higher in the following week, as the storm damage led to temporary job losses. In the hardest hit areas, schools were closed for more than a week.

Schools alone can cause major disruptions to the initial claims data when they're closed unexpectedly, as contract workers like cafeteria servers, janitors and bus drivers can file unemployment claims when they're not working -- even if it's merely temporarily.

Sandy victims can get unemployment help

The national unemployment rate was 7.9% in October, as 12.3 million people were counted as officially unemployed. Not all of those people receive benefits though.

As of the last week in October, 3.1 million people filed claims for their second week or more of jobless benefits. That's down about 500,000 from a year ago.