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DoD To Implement Retroactive Stop Loss Special Pay
The Defense Department announced today the services' implementation plans to provide retroactive stop loss special pay. Active, reserve and former service members who had their enlistment extended or retirement suspended due to stop loss are eligible for this special pay, if they served on active duty between Sept. 11, 2001 and Sept. 30, 2009.
Service members may begin submitting their claim for retroactive stop loss special pay on Oct. 21, 2009. In accordance with the 2009 Supplemental Appropriations Act, all applications must be submitted to the respective services no later than Oct. 21, 2010. Eligible personnel will receive a payment of $500 per month for each month (or any portion of a month) that a member was retained on active duty due to stop loss. Applicants for retroactive pay who are no longer in the military had to be honorably discharged, and for those who were stop lossed in fiscal 2009, may only receive payment from one stop loss authority either the money appropriated for stop loss special pay in the Duncan Hunter National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2009, or the money allocated for retroactive stop loss special pay in the 2009 Supplemental Appropriations Act, but not both.
Service members must provide documented proof they were stop lossed with their claim. Family members of deceased service members should contact the appropriate military service for assistance in filing their claim.
Information on how to contact each of the services is listed below:
Navy: Email NXAG_N132C@navy.mil
Air Force: Go to http://www.afpc.randolph.af.mil/stoploss/
Stop loss provides a valuable and critical tool to quickly retain and generate forces to surge in a major conflict. However, as deployment schedules stabilize, the department must then adapt and minimize its use of stop loss. The secretary of defense announced in March a comprehensive plan to eliminate the current use of stop loss, while retaining the authority for future use under extraordinary circumstances.
Program Manager Explains Delay in 'Stop Loss' Claims
By Navy Lt. Jennifer Cragg
WASHINGTON, Dec. 11, 2009 - After an initial delay caused by software and manpower issues, the first retroactive payments will be disbursed next week to soldiers who were retained on active duty involuntarily under the so-called "Stop Loss" program.
Army Maj. Roy Whitley, program manager for the Army's Retroactive Stop Loss Special Pay program, acknowledged problems over the program's first 50 days and said officials are working to reduce the current backlog for the thousands more who are expected to file their claims over the next year.
"We are going to plow through the backlog as quickly as we can," said Whitley, who spoke with bloggers and online journalists yesterday during an Army bloggers roundtable.
"We lost time [by] improving the claims end early on," he said. "For every day we spent working the claims, we knew we were losing a day on development and case management.
"We are building it out [and] improving software. [That is] the reason why you are seeing some delay."
Parts of the initial Web-based claims program, launched Oct. 21, lacked complete functionality, and many of the claims were processed manually, Whitley said. However, he added, the case-management software is expected to be finalized this week, closing at least 1,000 cases. Those cases will then be forwarded to Defense Finance and Accounting Service for payment.
"The latest enhancement gives us the ability to close the cases," Whitley said, and will allow Army claims managers to advise claimants on the status of their claims.
He added that he is working on adding more claims managers to his staff of 14. "We saw the volume coming forward," he said, "and we knew we had to make some changes both on software and personnel."
As soon as the software changes are tested and finalized, he added, his staff will be better able to ease the backlog.
"We are hoping this will knock down on the anxiety caused by our backlog and e-mails," Whitley said. "We are really working through those and trying to focus exclusively on claims clearing."
The deadline to submit Stop Loss pay claims is Oct. 21.
