Posted on 01/05/2004 5:46:16 PM PST by xzins
Army Addresses Pay Problems January 2004
The Army is working on immediate actions to eliminate the pay problems of deployed soldiers, and long-term solutions are also under way. "The basic pay and allowances for most soldiers is there. It's the situation-unique entitlements based on location, dependent status, special skills – these are the one's that, because they require additional documentation and inputs, fall through the cracks," Eric Reid, chief of Finance and Accounting Oversight and Field Operations Division, U.S. Army Finance Command, said.
Reid said most difficulties lie in special entitlements built into the pay process.
"For example, the day a soldier steps in country, he starts receiving hostile fire pay. He also is eligible for hardship duty pay location (HDP-L), but although his time starts on the first day, he has to be there for 30 days to be eligible.
After 30 days, it's paid retroactively to the first day. He is also eligible for a combat zone tax exemption, and possibly for a family separation allowance.
For some entitlements, the finance technician must input it in the system on a monthly basis," Reid said.
"The hardship duty pay is an example, they have to do an input every month for that entitlement," he said.
This issue becomes even more complex for soldiers who are in specialized units like special forces, who receive special entitlements including jump pay and extra pay for doing high-altitude, low-opening jumps. "But there aren't that many soldiers who do those things," Reid said.
In addition to the hardship duty pay for soldiers in theater, he said there is one other major entitlement that must be entered separately each month for most soldiers, the continental United States cost of living allowance. "Yes, the GAO (General Accounting Office) used a case study technique which focused on only special forces and military police units, but I can tell you there are similar problems across the board that we're working to address," Reid said.
He said most problems occur for reserve component soldiers when they are either initially mobilizing or when they return from mobilization.
"There are some issues where there are delays in getting them in the system when they mobilize and off the system when they're demobilized," Reid said.
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| Rank | Location | Receipts | Donors/Avg | Freepers/Avg | Monthlies | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 45 | Norway | 50.00 |
1 |
50.00 |
14 |
3.57 |
|
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This one amazed me....they're hand-jamming every single hardship pay and cost of living allowance EVERY MONTH!
In the computer age there's something idiotic in that.
Why can't they just tell the soldier that when they leave the hardship area or change their COL location that they ARE ORDERED to report changed status under penalty of UCMJ for defrauding the Gov't?
Then they only have to input once.
:>)
Oh, it gets better. You should see what it's like in a Guard unit, where some special pays have to be put in by the unit in theater, and some special pays have to be put in by the finance clerks at the state HQ in the home state.
In our unit we had base pay which varies by rank, housing allowance which varies by location of home and rank, rations allowance, jump pay, dive pay (selected personnel), family sep (those with dependents), imminent danger [combat] pay, SF proficiency pay (everyone except about five support guys), language proficiency pay (varies with language and skill in said language... one soldier can draw it for several languages), and the way they did the tax reimbursement is to collect the tax one month and reimburse it the next. I have over 200 leave and earning statements from that year (normal is two a month), most of them correcting errors and correcting the corrections. I have absolutely no clue what I got paid and whether it was what I had coming, except that I know that $330/month in language pay vanished in the system somewhere. I have orders awarding it, just no money ;)
Half of the problem is that the military finance system is a mess, with too many clerks making too arcane rules, and the other half of the problem is that Congress micromanages most of it in law and it would take legislative change to make any sense of it. Congress would rather hold hearings where they can scream at some innocent Colonel from the Pentagon and pretend that Something Will Be Done.
I'm still trying to figure out why we pay combat pay to people who never hear a gunshot unless somebody screws up clearing his weapon... but the Army is a big believer in equality, as long as it's not the enlisted swine asking for it.
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
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