Posting Allowance

Topic

Posting Allowance

Case number

• 2015-106 (F&R date: 2015-07-31)

Issue

The posting allowance is largely based on a member's rate of pay and while it is supposed to compensate for relocation turbulence and not actual expenses, the reality is that it is currently used to compensate for actual expenses.

Recommendation

The Committee recommended that the role of the Posting Allowance (PA) be clarified and that a new, rank and salary neutral, model be developed to account for the turbulence associated with relocating.

Final Authority decision

The Final Authority (FA), the Chief of the Defence Staff did not agree with the Committee's recommendation to grant redress by seeking Treasury Board (TB) approval to retroactively change the benefit, as well as to review all similar cases. The FA concluded that changes to the Canadian Forces Integrated Relocation Program were brought as part of the Canadian Armed Forces' effort at deficit reduction, unfortunately without reflection on the second order effects. He stated that with a number of benefits having moved from the custom to the personalized envelope, the latter most often being solely comprised the PA, this resulted in the PA being used to offset moving expenses rather than its stated intent of providing an extra benefit for the disruption that relocation causes. As such, the FA agreed with the Committee that reimbursement of the high expenses related to moving pets OUTCAN should not come from the personalized envelope. He directed the Chief of Military Personnel develop a TB submission to rectify the issue going forward.