Imminent Danger, Hardship Pay Changes Announced
March 30, 2007

Periodically, the Department of Defense conducts world-wide reviews to determine whether a continued imminent danger area designation is appropriate. Imminent danger pay is compensation paid at the rate of $225 a month to recognize duty in a foreign area in which the member was subject to the threat of physical harm or imminent danger on the basis of civil insurrection, civil war, terrorism, or wartime conditions.

The Department of Defense announced today that the following locations will no longer be classified imminent danger pay zones:

Angola, Georgia, Sierra Leone, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, and Macedonia.

Hardship duty-location is compensation paid to recognize members in designated hardship duty locations (i.e. areas where quality of life is substantially below that most members in the U.S. generally experience). Factors considered include physical environment, living conditions, and personal security.

To ensure members in these areas are compensated appropriately, increases to hardship duty-location (HDP-L) will occur in the following areas:

Angola, Georgia, and Sierra Leone are increased from $100 to $150 a month.
Macedonia is increased from $0 to $100 a month.

All of the above changes are effective Nov. 1, 2007.