DoD to Implement Retroactive Stop Loss Special Pay
October 21, 2009
UPDATED JAN. 5, 2010
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:
- Army: Go to https://www.stoplosspay.army.mil or email [email protected]
- Navy: Email [email protected]
- Marine Corps: Go to https://www.manpower.usmc.mil/stoploss or email [email protected]
- 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.
UPDATE: Section 8108 of the 2010 Defense Department Appropriations Act, effective Dec. 19, 2009, contained provisions that modified eligibility for retroactive stop loss special pay. Stop-lossed service members who voluntarily reenlisted or extended their service, and received a bonus for such reenlistment or extension of service, are no longer eligible to receive retroactive stop loss special pay.
Applications from affected service members will be returned with an explanation of the change in law that made them no longer eligible. The military services will not recoup previously issued payments.
Congress also extended legal authority for stop loss special pay to continue payments to active duty service members extended under stop loss authority through fiscal 2010.