# 2021-307 Pay and Benefits, Foreign Service Directives

Case summary

F&R Date: 2023-11-30

The grievor argued that he had been aggrieved by the inability of the chain of command to secure a Post Differential Allowance (PDA) for his post in Romania. The grievor submitted that upon his arrival at his post, no PDA assessment had been completed and it was not until several months later that personnel received the forms to request that their post be assigned a hardship level. The grievor also noted that changes to the Foreign Service Directive 58 did not appear to be COVID-19 driven, and as such, the Interdepartmental Post Hardship Review Committee had continued to meet and make decisions regarding other post requirements, while not making a decision regarding his post, which affected Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) members and their families at remote post in eastern Europe. As redress, the grievor requested that his post be assigned a PDA level equal to, or greater than a hardship level II (in alignment of the PDA level of Bucharest), and that the associated assigned PDA be backdated to the begininging of his posting. The grievor also requested the continuation of the PDA bonus for time served abroad relating to being posted to Craiova directly from another post outside of Canada and that the Vacation Travel Allowance (VTA) policy be applied and backdated according to the hardship level assigned.

There is no Initial Authority decision on file and the Canadian Force Grievance Authority analyst recommended that the grievance go directly to the Final Authority (FA) for determination. 

The Committee noted that following the Committee's receipt of the grievance, the grievor's post was designated a hardship level II, backdated to his deployment start date. Over the course of its review of the grievance, the Committee confirmed that the grievor had received payment for both the PDA and some of the associated additional benefits related to travel from post, although the grievor reported that some of the enhancements to the VTA associated with a hardship level II designation had yet to be paid. The Committee therefore found that the grievor was aggrieved by the omission of the CAF and that the grievor was provided with some remedies. As the Committee had been made aware of a decision by the CAF to designate the grievor's post a level II hardship, the Committee found that this point was moot. The Committee found that the extraordinarily late recognition of the hardship suffered by the grievor was an egregious omission by the CAF, and that it was a reasonable expectation of a CAF member that such a determination would occur prior to be ordered to serve at a new post, and that the delay in receiving such recognition diminished the nature of the member's service. The Committee found that this issue was further compounded by the fact that the grievor had still not been received payment for some of the aggrieved benefits, more than a year and a half after his post hardship level II designation. 

The Committee recommended that the FA ensure that all entitlements have been paid to the grievor and that the FA apologize for the maladministration of this matter by the CAF.