# 2024-214 Pay and Benefits, Relocation, Special Commuting Assistance

Case summary

F&R Date: 2025-08-21

The grievor challenged the decision of the Canadian Armed Forces to deny him Special Commuting Assistance (SCA) in 2022. The grievor had been on Imposed Restriction (IR) and returned to his principal residence where his Dependents Household Goods and Effects ((D) HG and E) were in July 2020. This residence was outside of the geographical area of his duty location because he chose to move his family in 2015 for personal reasons. The grievor argued that since the geographical zones had changed while he was on IR, he should have been offered the option to move. As redress, the grievor requested that SCA be granted retroactively to July 2020, or, if deemed inadmissible, that clear explanations be provided.

The Director General Compensation and Benefits, as the Initial Authority (IA) denied the grievance. The IA explained that the grievor last move at public expense had been in the geographical area of the new place of duty and that he was not entitled to a cost move as confirmed on his posting message.

The Committee did not dispute the reasoning provided in the denial decision but did observe that there seemed to have been an assumption that the grievor’s (D) HG&E was in the geographic region of the new duty location. Had the grievor submitted his request to reside outside the geographic region at the time of the posting to his Commanding Officer, it may have necessitated a change to the posting message, or possibly not if a waiver agreeing not to claim SCA had been signed when first moving outside the geographical boundaries.

However, the Committee found that the grievor was not entitled to receive SCA as he was not eligible for a Crown-funded relocation and the grievor moved back to his principal residence in a relocation considered a conclusion to his IR. The Committee recommended that the Final Authority not afford the grievor redress.