Q. I have two questions that pertain to FERS retirement and sick leave. First, if I understand this correctly when I retire, I assume it will be in 2014 or later, and I’ve met the requirements of MRA and number of years of service. Assume the day I retire that I have 37 years of service (34 government and three years military) and two months, 13 days left over. Let’s also assume that I have 11 months, 20 days of accrued sick leave. The two would be combined to give me a total of 38 years, two months, three days. Because I would only be credited with whole months (174 hours or 30 days) the three days would not be used towards my annuity calculation, leaving me 38 years two months. Is this correct?
My second question is, would the sick leave be also used towards calculating my Special Retirement Supplement. My military time would not be used towards this calculation leaving me 34/40’s but would my sick leave be added leaving me 35/40’s. Also would I get credited with any additional full months or is this calculated using full years only?
A. First, I won’t grade your homework, but only agree that any time that doesn’t add up to a full month (approximately 174 hours) is dropped. Second, unused sick leave isn’t used in the calculation of a special retirement supplement. It is based solely on the actual time you were employed under FERS. To estimate what that would be, take the most recent Social Security benefit estimate provided by the Social Security Administration, divide it by 40, and multiply it by your total years of FERS service, rounded up to the next highest year.
