Maximizing Technician Pay (w/ Alert)

[Bayou_Eagle_Driver]

Hey Folks -

I've read through the majority of threads/posts on this topic; but I couldn't find any specific answers.

Question: I work at a squadron that works 4 10hr days/week (Mondays off). I'm transitioning from an AGR job to a GS-13 Technician Job. As a technician, I'm going to attempt to maximize my pay when sitting alert by doing that on the weekends, so should I consider Mondays for all intents and purposes a weekend day?

Any other tips/advice other Techs can offer for maximizing my yearly gross income and minimizing my taxable? After running the numbers, it looks like I'm going to be just about matching my AGR take-home pay (13-year Capt, 8 yrs DSG enlisted). Which seems unfortunate due to the lackluster retirement plan and increased medical expenses for a family of 3.

Attached is the spreadsheet I've been using to get some basic estimates.

Cheers

Pay-Ret Calculator 15 year version FERS High3.xlsx

[Guardian]

What status are you in during alert hours?

[matmacwc]

Earn comp so you can have enough leave to double dip if you sit during the week.  Any non work day would be maximizing your pay without burning any leave but you could end up working a couple weeks straight which would be miserable.  

[Polar Bear]

Were you forced out of the AGR?

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[Gazmo]

You're going to be hard pressed to make what you made as a Sr. 0-3 AGR and it'll only get worse as you gain rank. You also won't get the ACP. Did they hire you as a step 1 or something higher?

I assume you're a fighter guy pulling Title 10 - Noble Eagle alert on the weekends? We had that in the tanker world, but lost it 2 years ago to the AD. I took a $15,000 pay cut! Alert is a good deal. Can you pull alert from home?

I worked on a fairly extensive Excel-base calculator that I've been trying to develop as an eye-opening ART recruiting/retention tool for my unit. The difference between ART and AGR pay is significant and really justifies bringing an O-4 type in as a Step 7 with a 25% rentention bonus to get anything near what an AGR would make with ACP. That was factoring in 84 Inactive Duty Periods.

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[herkbum]

You're going to be hard pressed to make what you made as a Sr. 0-3 AGR and it'll only get worse as you gain rank. You also won't get the ACP. Did they hire you as a step 1 or something higher?

I assume you're a fighter guy pulling Title 10 - Noble Eagle alert on the weekends? We had that in the tanker world, but lost it 2 years ago to the AD. I took a $15,000 pay cut! Alert is a good deal. Can you pull alert from home?

I worked on a fairly extensive Excel-base calculator that I've been trying to develop as an eye-opening ART recruiting/retention tool for my unit. The difference between ART and AGR pay is significant and really justifies bringing an O-4 type in as a Step 7 with a 25% rentention bonus to get anything near what an AGR would make with ACP. That was factoring in 84 Inactive Duty Periods.

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Can you post your Excel spreadsheet? I would like to share it with my technicians.

[Gazmo]

Sure. Let me do a little more work on it and I'll post it up.

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[Bayou_Eagle_Driver]

On 3/24/2016 at 8:35 PM, herkbum said:

Can you post your Excel spreadsheet? I would like to share it with my technicians.

Yes please.

 

Caseylf - No I wasn't.

[Bayou_Eagle_Driver]

On 3/21/2016 at 4:29 PM, matmacwc said:

Earn comp so you can have enough leave to double dip if you sit during the week.  Any non work day would be maximizing your pay without burning any leave but you could end up working a couple weeks straight which would be miserable.  

I've calculated my weekly work hours to generate enough comp time to double dip all AFTPs / UTAs - so the comp time isn't available to double dip alert. Not to mention I'm pretty sure that we're not allowed to double dip alert tours anymore. 

[UPT-hopeful]

11 minutes ago, Bayou_Eagle_Driver said:

 Not to mention I'm pretty sure that we're not allowed to double dip alert tours anymore. 

You absolutely can double dip with alert tours, or any other military orders for that matter. You must be in some sort of a civilian leave status, however, to get paid for both civilian and a full day of military orders. Same with inactive military training period if it encompasses part of your civilian normally scheduled duty hours  

What you can't do any more is the famous "three for ones."

[Polar Bear]

Can you post your Excel spreadsheet? I would like to share it with my technicians.

Yes please.

 

Caseylf - No I wasn't.

Why would you trade being an AGR for ART?

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[Bayou_Eagle_Driver]

I'm 14 years into my career, most of my 8 years as an enlisted maintainer were as a technician (I don't have the points to make pursuing an AGR retirement feasible). I'm also local to my guard unit, with a family (2 years orders vs indefinite...) It made sense when jobs were being dived up.

Edited March 25, 2016 by Bayou_Eagle_Driver

[Polar Bear]

Fair enough, just seems like Art's work more for less pay. But if you want to punch at 20 instead of pursuing an AGR retirement that makes sense.

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[Polar Bear]

Wait, don't you have to be 55 to get a federal retirement?

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[Gazmo]

 Not to mention I'm pretty sure that we're not allowed to double dip alert tours anymore. 

You absolutely can double dip with alert tours, or any other military orders for that matter. You must be in some sort of a civilian leave status, however, to get paid for both civilian and a full day of military orders. Same with inactive military training period if it encompasses part of your civilian normally scheduled duty hours  

What you can't do any more is the famous "three for ones."

Yes, a lot of the good deals that equalized the ART vs AGR debate are gone and many of us that have 6+ years to go to a 20 yr AD retirement are leaving for airline careers now before it's too late.

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[Gazmo]

Wait, don't you have to be 55 to get a federal retirement?

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57, I believe, but you get penalized if you don't wait until 60.

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[Polar Bear]

What's the penalty if you don't make it?

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[ImNotARobot]

Anyone able to explain "Rule 44" or "44 leave" to me like I'm 5? Not exactly on topic with the alert thread, but certainly in line with maximizing ART pay. I understand the concept of using the most restrictive rule first, but not familiar with this 44 leave (with respect to overseas military orders). Thanks.

[UPT-hopeful]

2 hours ago, ImNotARobot said:

Anyone able to explain "Rule 44" or "44 leave" to me like I'm 5? Not exactly on topic with the alert thread, but certainly in line with maximizing ART pay. I understand the concept of using the most restrictive rule first, but not familiar with this 44 leave (with respect to overseas military orders). Thanks.

You get paid for your technician weekly hours and holidays as you would normally - whatever your normal work schedule is. 

You're title 10 for points only, no pay during the week.  

Then, on holidays and weekends you get paid normal military and orders. 

 

So, if your tech normal week is 4x10s, you get that civilian pay plus 3 days of military pay. You also get TriCare the whole time. 

You can only do that for 44-days in a CY, but that's at the rate of 8-hour work days so you have to "prorate" for 4x10s. 

 

It it can be a good deal if you work it right. You can still double dip like normal too. 

 

Its a paperwork nightmare as your coming on and off (pay and non pay orders) a lot. 

[ImNotARobot]

Anyone able to explain "Rule 44" or "44 leave" to me like I'm 5? Not exactly on topic with the alert thread, but certainly in line with maximizing ART pay. I understand the concept of using the most restrictive rule first, but not familiar with this 44 leave (with respect to overseas military orders). Thanks.

You get paid for your technician weekly hours and holidays as you would normally - whatever your normal work schedule is. 

You're title 10 for points only, no pay during the week.  

Then, on holidays and weekends you get paid normal military and orders. 

 

So, if your tech normal week is 4x10s, you get that civilian pay plus 3 days of military pay. You also get TriCare the whole time. 

You can only do that for 44-days in a CY, but that's at the rate of 8-hour work days so you have to "prorate" for 4x10s. 

 

It it can be a good deal if you work it right. You can still double dip like normal too. 

 

Its a paperwork nightmare as your coming on and off (pay and non pay orders) a lot. 

Thanks dude! (Or dudette)

[Gazmo]

Anyone able to explain "Rule 44" or "44 leave" to me like I'm 5? Not exactly on topic with the alert thread, but certainly in line with maximizing ART pay. I understand the concept of using the most restrictive rule first, but not familiar with this 44 leave (with respect to overseas military orders). Thanks.

You get paid for your technician weekly hours and holidays as you would normally - whatever your normal work schedule is.  You're title 10 for points only, no pay during the week.  

Then, on holidays and weekends you get paid normal military and orders. 

 

So, if your tech normal week is 4x10s, you get that civilian pay plus 3 days of military pay. You also get TriCare the whole time. 

You can only do that for 44-days in a CY, but that's at the rate of 8-hour work days so you have to "prorate" for 4x10s. 

 

It it can be a good deal if you work it right. You can still double dip like normal too. 

 

Its a paperwork nightmare as your coming on and off (pay and non pay orders) a lot. 

Thanks dude! (Or dudette)

This is really designed for people who make more money as a Federal Civilian Employee than they do on military orders. For example, say you are an E-5 in the military, but are a GS-13 in the civilian world. You make more as a GS-13 than as an E-5 on Active Duty. You can use the 44-Day Leave rule to match your Civ pay. For example, if you make $4,000 per pay period as a GS-13, but only make $2,500 per pay period as an E-4 on orders, you can get the extra $1,500 to make up for what you're losing being on orders for 44 days. It's not double dipping. You can use your mil leave like normal and then after that runs out, you can use the 44-day leave rule. It's definitely complicated and better be worth the hassle to do it. For most of us officer types, O-3 and above, we all make more money on Active Duty orders, so you'll never really need to do this.

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[Bayou_Eagle_Driver]

On ‎3‎/‎26‎/‎2016 at 11:33 AM, Gazmo said:

This is really designed for people who make more money as a Federal Civilian Employee than they do on military orders. For example, say you are an E-5 in the military, but are a GS-13 in the civilian world. You make more as a GS-13 than as an E-5 on Active Duty. You can use the 44-Day Leave rule to match your Civ pay. For example, if you make $4,000 per pay period as a GS-13, but only make $2,500 per pay period as an E-4 on orders, you can get the extra $1,500 to make up for what you're losing being on orders for 44 days. It's not double dipping. You can use your mil leave like normal and then after that runs out, you can use the 44-day leave rule. It's definitely complicated and better be worth the hassle to do it. For most of us officer types, O-3 and above, we all make more money on Active Duty orders, so you'll never really need to do this.

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Gazmo -

I wonder if I'm missing something.

I'm a 13-yr O-3, and I've calculated 1 AT day gives me $265.67 (Basic+BAH2+BAS+Flight)/30 and my GS-13 job gives me $369.23 for the same 8-hr day.

So, with this being the case, if I've used most of my Mil Leave already this year on AT, and there's another 2-week'er to Nellis coming up, I should burn whatever Mil Leave I have remaining, then use the 44-Day Leave rule? (Otherwise, I'm losing ~$100/day on LWOP)

Does that sound about right? Does this 44-day policy have an official name?

 

Thanks!

Edited April 13, 2016 by Bayou_Eagle_Driver

[Gazmo]

It's only for overseas contingency operations.

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