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Aviation Continuation Pay (ACP - The Bonus)


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9 hours ago, Danger41 said:

So here goes a massive thread derail…are you all planning on disability upon separation/retirement? I’m more or less healthy and any issues I’ve got now are from getting older and fatter trying to keep up with my kids and work schedule. I would think that’s 0% disabled?

 

Not planning on anything, but based on recently retired squadron mates it seems there will be something.  After a career of flying fighters, I'm guessing some sort of rating after all the neck and back issues I've had.  

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I wish I had done it earlier, but after now paying 2x VA funding fees and realizing much of this standard stuff won't affect FAA Class I...do it ASAP! I could have had this shit done years ago, and have missed out because of my unfounded fear of it screwing over my flying career. Ideally you have a bro flight doc who will go over your "hypothetical" records and give you advice. Neck, back, joints, fucked up finger from when you took a cue ball to the hand playing crud, tinnitus, liver isn't pulling its weight like when you were 25...all service connected. Anything mental health related (PTSD) and sleep related will cause you some level of asspain with the FAA (but not necessarily show stoppers). This all according to my flight doc who's also an AME.

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14 minutes ago, brabus said:

I wish I had done it earlier, but after now paying 2x VA funding fees and realizing much of this standard stuff won't affect FAA Class I...do it ASAP! I could have had this shit done years ago, and have missed out because of my unfounded fear of it screwing over my flying career. Ideally you have a bro flight doc who will go over your "hypothetical" records and give you advice. Neck, back, joints, fucked up finger from when you took a cue ball to the hand playing crud, tinnitus, liver isn't pulling its weight like when you were 25...all service connected. Anything mental health related (PTSD) and sleep related will cause you some level of asspain with the FAA (but not necessarily show stoppers). This all according to my flight doc who's also an AME.

Had someone recommend that if you are a male you are missing a proverbial gold mine if you don't have a full hormone spectrum done before you get out since most males are easily diagnosable with low testosterone by their mid 30's. Anyone have experience with this? 

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For retirees, 50% is the magic number.  49% and below, your VA disability pay is deducted from your retirement pay.  Very small tax benefit. 50% and above, retirement and VA disability are both payed out.  VA essentially pays my mortgage right now.      

Don’t forget. If you get less than 50% and you are divorced, it’s less that the ex-wife can get of your retirement.
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On 2/9/2022 at 5:49 AM, SocialD said:

 

Glad I wasn't the only one confused but that post.  Even, part-timers who retire from the ANG/AFRES start getting their VA disability payments right away.  

You guys made a good point about getting VA disability when you separate early. That wasn’t something I took into consideration when I decided to stay in.

$17k a year is definitely nice. I was just saying that $40k (tax free) on top of a $50k AD retirement with health care at 45 is probably enough for me to retire and I had no idea that was even a possibility  when I decided to stick it out to 20. Just trying to pass what I’ve learned along the way. 

No wrong choices out there. Best of luck to everyone… whatever path you decide.  

 

 

 

Edited by Lifer
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2 hours ago, Hunter Rose said:

So any word on when they actually plan to release this years bonus details? Keeping out hope for a $35K bonus with 1 year  commitment...daddy needs a new Jet Ski before he retires!

 

I’d expect it once the gov has a full budget for the year and not these 6-9 week CR’s kicking the can down the road. 

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  • 3 weeks later...

Bonus. “It’s essential”.

AD program. Capped at 35k per year by law (he claimed). O5 and below. Tiers. And required after pilot commitment complete.

2022 doesn’t have an appropriations bill yet or CR. So no bonus program yet. They saw 2020 and 2021 bonus takers were similar to pre covid. Roughly bonus paid out per year = 194 million.

Sounds like they are trying to change the bonus program completely. A big overhaul for 2023. They are planning on starting from scratch and potentially asking for relief from current laws. He claims it could look significantly different than the bonus in the recent decades.

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Question asked about airline hiring and how to retain people.

Answer. Retention working group looks to solve pilot problem by getting them into the guard and reserve (guard and reserve doesn’t have a retention problem btw). Sounds like they are pushing for guard and reserve to take in more people and more experienced people. So far he’s not talking about why that’s in the individual pilots benefit. Just the AF’s benefit.

He is talking about figuring out how to make bonus more money and how to make pilots lives better. No real details on how but just that they are looking at it. He brought up the we have less deployments to the CENTCOM AOR so that should help. Then he admitted that he has no real solutions right now.

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Asked about what are they doing to take additional duties off pilots backs (question about being and RA and instructor pilot). He didn’t say if it was on their radar prior to the question but did say it is now. Went into additional duties being downgraded. But then went into why it’s important to the AF works for the AF. And how if as an RA you know how the AFdoes money that it will be extremely important for you. So he side stepped the question kinda. And said that RA’s learn how the AF’s money works (debatable general. Agree to disagree). “The more you learn about money, the better off you will be in your Air Force Career.”

He did say they are making a push for admin people in the squadrons.

Then the moderator spoke up in favor of additional duties.

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7 minutes ago, Guardian said:

Talent market place question. WTF is that? Never heard of it.

You've never done the MyVector thing where you see all the avaliable jobs for your rank and AFSC?

It's what replaced the old ADP.

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3 minutes ago, Guardian said:

Asked about what are they doing to take additional duties off pilots backs (question about being and RA and instructor pilot). He didn’t say if it was on their radar prior to the question but did say it is now. Went into additional duties being downgraded. But then went into why it’s important to the AF works for the AF. And how if as an RA you know how the AFdoes money that it will be extremely important for you. So he side stepped the question kinda. And said that RA’s learn how the AF’s money works (debatable general. Agree to disagree). “The more you learn about money, the better off you will be in your Air Force Career.”

He did say they are making a push for admin people in the squadrons.

Then the moderator spoke up in favor of additional duties.

I mean..... I see the point here. I hate additional duties more than any other. But the AF knows it grabs its future commanders and GO's from the pilot ranks. Before you command a squadron you've hopefully hopped a few shops in a squadron and understand their basic mechanisms that make them work. Before you lead a group, you hopefully understand the spending and resource allocation. Goes on.... but what he's basically getting at is you are learning the foundations that the government operates on. 

The problem is...... only 10% of pilots are going to command. For the other 90% of pilots this a waste of time and its frankly exhausting. At the same time, we as a pilot union, get peeved when the AF crops its future leaders too early in their career and funnels them into better jobs. So I don't really have a good solution on this one either. 

5 minutes ago, Guardian said:

Talent market place question. WTF is that? Never heard of it.

Replace the Airman Development Plan for finding and allocating assignments. You now bid on a assignments and commanders of those assignments can bid on you. Then some algorithm assigns you based on bids and needs of the Air Force. 

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He just spent a lot of time talking about how do we lower washout rate from pilot training. And then threw a little caveat about how they want to make sure that the pilots are good.

Seemed more important to him to lower the washout rate based on total amount of time spent on that in his answer.

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Asked how he was going to get money and less additional duties. He responded that we aren’t aviators that are officers. We are officers that are aviators. Then went on to talk about officer ship. And how being an officer is more important than being an aviator but then discussed how we have to be as good of pilots as possible.

So I like the guy and feel for him but that was a tough one for him to answer. He spoke about things that don’t equal each other. He wants pilots to be the best officers they can be by having additional duties and leadership responsibilities while being the best absolute aviator and warfighter possible. For most, those things can’t happen at the same time.

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Worth the watch. A little over an hour long.

Bottom line no 22 bonus yet till an appropriations bill is approved potential large bonus structure change in 23 (and they want people who sign the 22 or earlier to be able to sign on the 23 bonus).

No change likely in additional duties, hired additional squadron help, or max amount in money for 22.

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26 minutes ago, Guardian said:

Asked how he was going to get money and less additional duties. He responded that we aren’t aviators that are officers. We are officers that are aviators. Then went on to talk about officer ship. And how being an officer is more important than being an aviator but then discussed how we have to be as good of pilots as possible.

So I like the guy and feel for him but that was a tough one for him to answer. He spoke about things that don’t equal each other. He wants pilots to be the best officers they can be by having additional duties and leadership responsibilities while being the best absolute aviator and warfighter possible. For most, those things can’t happen at the same time.

Yeah, the problem is really difficult to solve unless there are some fundamental changes to the way the AF recruits, mentors and manages pilot manpower.

I honestly thing we need a holistic look at force structure in general, starting with the officer/enlisted paradigm. Its something we grabbed from 17th century warfare and very little has been done to advance it.  Not saying I have the ideas or the solutions but that's the place I would start. 

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59 minutes ago, Guardian said:

Asked about what are they doing to take additional duties off pilots backs (question about being and RA and instructor pilot). He didn’t say if it was on their radar prior to the question but did say it is now. Went into additional duties being downgraded. But then went into why it’s important to the AF works for the AF. And how if as an RA you know how the AFdoes money that it will be extremely important for you. So he side stepped the question kinda. And said that RA’s learn how the AF’s money works (debatable general. Agree to disagree). “The more you learn about money, the better off you will be in your Air Force Career.”

He did say they are making a push for admin people in the squadrons.

Then the moderator spoke up in favor of additional duties.

I had to do RA stuff for a while. I learned very little about budgeting and a whole lot about what a pain DTS and GPC programs are to manage. 

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