Q. I started working for the federal government March 10, 1975. If I retire Dec. 31, 2015, by my calculations, I will have 40 years, nine months and 21 days.
Right now I have 1,142 hours of sick leave but have no idea how many I will have when I retire. Will any of that be counted toward year and months of service? I’m only a GS 7, step 10, so I need to know what percentage of my retirement pay I would get. My high-3 is more than $50,400 with locality pay. I understood that where you are living and getting locality pay would be figured toward the annuity. If they change our retirement to the high-5, in two years I will still be at the same salary.
A. To find out what your basic annuity will be, use this formula: .015 X your high-3 x 5 years of service, plus .0175 x your high-3 x 5 years of service, plus .02 x your high-3 x all remaining years and full months of service.
(Your high-3 is your highest three consecutive years of average basic pay, which includes locality pay.) Your unused sick leave will be added to any actual work days that don’t add up to a full month and used to increase the amount of your annuity. On average, 174 hours equals 1 month.
