Q: I was reinstated on a term appointment in 2003, and in 2005 the position was terminated. I took a permanent position with Bureau of Land Management. While in my term position, I was told to sign up for the Federal Employees Retirement System or my time would not count toward my tenure in this term position. I was told that when my term appointment ended and I accepted a permanent position, my tenure would continue and I could, at this time 2005-2008, opt to be reinstated as CSRS/FERS instead of FERS. I had requested to my BLM human resources person to do this but the paperwork was never completed and this person has retired. My leave/earnings paystub shows me as CSRS/FERS so I assumed I was; but now I am told no SF-50 action was ever done to make this change and my SF-50 shows FERS/FICA. I am requesting to my current HR office in BLM to fix this as it was a personnel/HR error.
Can this be corrected? and it so, what do I do about my FERS retirement
contributions? I was contributing around 11 percent from my pay with matching contributions. This is really a mess and apparently no one in BLM can tell me how to fix this or give me retirement annuity amounts. My file has been sent to three different BLM HR people and still no one answers my questions.
A: If you can’t get an answer from the HR folks in BLM, ask them to bump the matter up to the HR office at the departmental level. If the department has any problem resolving the matter, the staff there can go directly to the Office of Personnel Management for a definitive answer,
