Chida

Due to a lot of misinformation from Regular Retirees and ARPC not being clear on Reserve Retirement rules and having run into more than a couple reservists telling me they stayed in the SELRES/ANG for 24 years in order to "max the pay chart" for retirement, and I think, obviously the ARC enjoying that people do not understand and therefore serve additional years unnecessarily, I am compelled to write this and wish it to become common knowledge for anyone seeking a reserve retirement. The only stipulation to carry O-5 into retirement is serving on the Reserve Active Status List for 3 years Time in Grade. Now it is unclear that if those 3 years are only years on the RASL or if those 3 years need to be *good* years on the RASL. I would not want to press to test on this nuance, so let's say that those 3 years TIG need to be good years. The biggest distinguishing feature of the Reserve Retirement is that once you transfer to the retired reserve (AKA grey area) your years of service for the purposes of determining your high 36 continue to accrue until you reach age 60 (or whatever your age is for reduced reserve retirement). The reason that your finance office or ARPC will tell you that they have no idea what your reserve retirement pay will be and then refer you to any number of online calculators (which btw are designed for regular retirement and commonly misused by prospective reserve retirees) is because the calculation requires a look-back of 36 months and no one knows what the future pay charts will say. However, to get a pretty good idea we can use an example of a grey area retiree who reaches age 60 today (1 Apr 2019) and I will outline below what that looks like right now. The formula for calculating a reserve retirement: points/360*"high36"*.025. This gives you your monthly pay. Now the confusion arises as to what high-36 is. High 36 for our guy who is now 60 years old as of 1 Apr 2019 and entered the grey area 18 years ago at 42 years of age, he now has 38 years on the pay chart, thus maxing out the pay chart for O-5. He will have 36 months at $9521 (2019 pay chart is used for all 36 months), for a high 36 average of $9521. Assuming he has 5000 points, his retirement monthly pay will be 5000/360*$9521*.025=$3306. This math can be verified by the point valuation chart published by DFAS for 2019. Here is a link to the point valuation chart (Mypers): https://mypers.af.mil/ci/fattach/get/9805796/1553879360/redirect/1/filename/2019_POINT_VALUATION_FOR_RETIREMENT_BENEFITS_RESERVIST_AND_GUARD_MEMBERS.pdf Again, this is assuming he had 3 years TIG as an O-5 at his 20 years TIS. There is no need to serve in the SELRES/ANG for more than the time it takes to get 3 years TIG. The only online calculator that I have found that will give a correct answer is on the VPC Dashboard (accessed via Mypers). Main takeaway is that your years in service are all years on the active status list (both regular and reserve) plus the years spent in the grey area. If for some reason you do not get 3 years TIG as an O-5 on the active status list, you will enter the grey area as an O-4 (assuming you didn't get the 2 yr waiver) and then your retired pay will be based on maxing out the O-4 pay charts. Here is a link from ARPC that explains all the above in fairly confusing (to me, anyway) language: https://militarypay.defense.gov/Pay/Retirement/Reserve.aspx Info about transferring from active status to retired reserve (grey area): https://mypers.af.mil/app/answers/detail/a_id/14270 Also see the attachment which dispels additional rumors I've heard such as a regular retiree with IDT points gets a retirement re-calculation at age 60. I don't know how that rumor got started, but it's false. This is the 1405 service mentioned in the power point. Retirement_explained.pdf

Surely. Even as an Individual Ready Reserve member, you are on the Reserve Active Status List. Because you are active status you have the reserve sanctuary protection which states that once you reach 18 years Time in Service you may not be discharged (except for misconduct) prior to reaching 20 years. So what that means is that if you are twice non-selected for O-5 you will be discharged 6 months after the board results are made public, upon your second failure of selection--except if upon that date (2x FOS +6 mos) you are in sanctuary. We were talking about this 6 years ago:

Get to 18 yrs TIS before 2x FOS+6 mos and you’re in reserve sanctuary. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Palace Chase to guard, selres, ima, pirr—whatever works at your location. Minimum eligibility is serving two thirds of your commissioning ADSC. Apply 6 months to 1 yr prior to whatever your chosen date of separation is. There is also the career intermission program. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

If you had a break in service between regular and ARC, then you have to put in a year with ARC before being eligible to meet a promotion board. The reg states that upon boarding you must have had at least 1 yr of continuous service. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Might happen as a matter of course, but not a stated requirement. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Only thing I’ve heard of is DSG doing admissions liaison as an additional duty on a non-interference basis. Presumably for points, but IDK. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Delta is the only company I've ever heard of that has the rule that you can't do military duty while on company time. Most other companies don't care as long as it doesn't affect their operation. Example: You want to do something for points and/or pay. You're on a layover, long call reserve, or short call and you're able to leave your squadron immediately when called. At Delta this is prohibited. Most others OK. Any Delta guys want to confirm this?

Health insurance should not be a consideration. If your airline’s health insurance costs $800 per mo, TRS costs ~$300. That’s a savings of only $500 per mo. The airlines I have worked for I’ve had premiums of less than $100, and one reimbursed me for TRS so that was effectively $0. I’d like to retire from my civilian job at age 60, so having free Tricare age 60-65 will be nice as I won’t need to pay $1000 per mo retiree premiums from my company. Tricare for Life will be nice since I won’t need to pay for medigap or medicare advantage. BLIM (Bottom line in the middle): health insurance is not a factor for my continued service—it’s merely nice. The factor for me is the retirement and the RCSBP. If I die in the grey area my wife will immediately get an annuity. RBLAB (Rock bottom line at the bottom): Tricare is pretty darn good, but there are more important motivating factors in my opinion. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

For my part: AD was the biggest bait and switch imaginable. 1. Go thru USAFA: get UPT. Good deal 2. Go thru UPT: get good assignment. 3. Get to 1st duty: big FU. The attitude I received from management was “Thank god you’re done with that flying bs. Yeah, sure, you gotta maintain currency and, of course, upgrades, and all that other bs, but the main thing is YOUR CAREER!” Zero regard for service or mission. In fact, had a DO, later an OG, initials AM, who specifically advised me that deploying for OIF was a fool’s errand. It was his specific counsel that I should not deploy in order to work on my “career”. With solidly mid-level managers like this, seemingly throughout the service, is there any hope? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

You’ll meet the next reserve or guard promotion board as long as there’s no break in service. You can get on Mypers to see the schedule of boards. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

If I'm on the promotion list as an ANG officer, then prior to pinning-on, transfer to an AFRES billet (i.e. quit the guard and affiliate as a SELRES or PIRR), does AFRC promote me on my effective date (i.e. 7 yrs TIG)? Anyone have a reg reference or personal tale?

Scrolled=get your name on the list (scroll) that goes to Congress for Reserve commission approval. It used to be that the MPF would just give you a reserve commission based on converting your Regular commission, if you had one, or if not, then you obviously were a reserve officer on EAD and thus already had a reserve commission. Around the 2006 timeframe, all officers on EAD had their commissions converted from reserve to regular. And then the SECDEF came out with a policy that Regular officers had to get congressional approval to pick up a reserve commission if they transfer from the Active component to a Reserve component. Congress signs the scroll every quarter. So you need to get with an in-service reserve or guard recruiter to get your name on the scroll as soon as possible because it could take ~4 months for you to be approved for a reserve commission. I don't know how long the scroll is valid, but that should be step 1 for anyone who is about to separate. Once you are scrolled, you can separate and activate your reserve commission the next day and thus have no break in service. Why do you care about avoiding a break in service? The main reason for a 2x passed over regular officer is promotion. The rules state that to meet a board, you must have at least 1 year of continuous service (regular list and reserve active status list). So if you have a break in service when you switch to ARC, you will not meet the next promotion board in the ARC which occurs in the following year, which means your board will be your 2nd year in the reserve (because you will then have had 1 year of continuous service on the reserve active status list). BLAB (bottom line at the bottom): scroll now or you will get less money.

I did something similar. I paid for it myself and then a month or two later when everything was established, I drove over to the hotel with one of the comptroller girls, she swiped the unit card, and the hotel refunded me.

I once worked for a contract outfit that had a training bond of 1 year for initial qual and 6 months for a refresher. The reason was because the owner (retired Army) was tired of his employees going to work for his competition. In theory, one could be under a perpetual bond. The only escape was to refuse or have an excuse to delay training, to avoid acquiring a new training bond. It seems this is now the setup with regular AF.

Healthcare costs depend on the airline. At the airlines I’ve been, healthcare premiums ranged from 0 to 80 per month. One paid my Tricare Reserve Select premiums. One has retiree health insurance which pretty much torpedoes the whole “stay in for the healthcare!” argument. So to sum up: depends on the company.

There’s confusion on this subject because there are two disability ratings that one might receive. One is post-AD from the VA. The other is an in-service disability rating given by the DOD as a result of the Medical Review Board, which may or may not lead to a disability retirement. The two are totally separate processes.

Disregard what I said above: I was thinking about the reverse transfer, ie AFRES to ANG. What the reg says is in AFI 36-2005, 6.2. Practically speaking, you'll need only a 1288, but then the medical folks will want you to have some kind of statement saying you're fit for further service. Traditionally, this was on a Form 422, but you'll have to ask the gaining medical people what they want or need, plus consult with the gaining recruiter. The gaining recruiter is who will help you with initiating the 1288, so after you have a promise of hire from the squadron, your next stop should be the recruiter that services that squadron's area. After that, you'll work with your losing and gaining MPF to help the 1288 along the way. No doubt they'll want all manner of documents from you.

Get a DD368 from your losing mpf. Initiate 1288. Do a form 24. Process takes about 2 months.

Just got my final LES for CY17 and still have old flight pay rates.

We are now over 2 months into the new FY and still no comms about this. Any DSG or TR see the increase in flight pay on their LES, yet?

Question for medical folks. I have been told and I have read (in newsletters from ARPC and the medical community) an unattributed saying which is repeated quite regularly such that no one questions it. That saying is "You must be in a military status to use the MTF." I do not believe this is correct nowadays. The reason is because I have Tricare Reserve Select regardless of my military status, something that was not possible before around 2005 or so. TRS is basically Tricare Standard and people on Tricare *can* use the MTF on a space-available basis. How is it determined if space is available? No one can tell me that either. Their go-to is that space is unavailable. Easier to say "no" than to actually have to do something. So any docs or clinicians that can help me out with this and give me AFI references to support these two aphorisms, I'll appreciate it.

Just got my first LES for FY18 (in which I did FY18 duty) and no increase to flight pay. Also no communication about this from anyone. Just one more thing for me to have to track down and take care of. ANG btw.

Write a pretty darn good PRF based on their Navy records. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Osan has an Aero club. That's the only thing in ROK I am aware of. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk