Q. I am a CSRS employee and am planning to retire at the end of this year (2012). I wanted to bank my annual leave and have it paid out in 2013. Is this possible? Which is the better date: Dec. 29 or Jan. 2, 2013?
A. If you retire on either date, you won’t receive your lump-sum annual leave payment until 2013. However, it’s hard to understand why you would even consider retiring Jan. 3. Dec. 29 is the end of a pay period; if you retired then, you’d receive credit for any annual and sick leave you’d accrued in that two-week period and you’d be on the annuity roll in January. On the other hand, if you retired Jan. 3, a few days into a pay period, you not only wouldn’t get partial credit for any annual or sick leave, but your January annuity payment would only be for nine-tenths of the normal amount.
