UPDATED: Senator asks Gates: How long will it take to get retroactive stop-loss pay?
Published: December 2, 2009
You’ve been asking questions about retroactive stop-loss pay, and now Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., wants answers too.
Since Oct. 21, each of the services has been accepting applications from people stop-lossed September 2001 and September 2008. Those eligible can receive $500 for every month they were held beyond their initial end of service.
But several people have complained on this blog that they are not getting answers from the Army about their applications, or they have been told there is a problem with their applications prompting a delay while their case is reviewed by a case manager.
Lautenberg’s office has heard similar complaints, and today sent a letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates looking for more information.
“I am concerned by reports that members of the Army are having problems with the website established by the service to accept applications for the program,” Lautenberg wrote. “Reports indicate that 80 percent of the claims that have been submitted to the Army have been disputed and assigned to a case manager and currently no payments have been distributed.”
Lautenberg asks Gates for the total number of claims each of the services have received; each service’s process to distribute the money, and how long that will take for undisputed claims and applications referred to case managers.
UPDATE 12/3: Steve Burghardt, a spokesman for the Defense Finance and Accounting Service explained that funding for retroactive stop-loss pay has only been available since Nov. 19, meaning checks could not go out until then.
As of Nov. 23, DFAS received 1,145 approved applications from the Air Force and 284 applications from the Army, Burghardt said. The first Air Force checks went out on Nov. 25.
Army spokeswoman Jill Mueller posted on this earlier blog post that the first batch of claims sent to DFAS were a “pilot,” and several thousand more are ready to be sent there once those first have been paid.
The first Army payments could go out late next week, she said.
