Happy 147th Medical Corps Birthday from the Corps Chief, the SG, and Me
Today is the 147th Medical Corp birthday. Happy birthday!
The Surgeon General’s birthday messages are here:
Medical Corps Birthday from SG (PDF)
A Message from the Navy Surgeon General – Celebrating 147 years of the Medical Corps
The Medical Corps Chief’s message is here:
Medical Corps Birthday from Corps Chief (PDF)
Happy birthday from me! Here’s my present to you:
- Read this post and do what it says.
- Tell American Express that you are Active Duty.
- A few weeks later (assuming you have an AMEX card), you might get some money credited to you.
Just by doing this, I got $213 back from them. Happy birthday!
End-of-the-Month Personal Finance Summary
We started two new features on the financial blog. The first is a Critical Action you can review every Saturday. After a year, you’ll have your act together! Here they are:
The second is a Sunday AAR (After Action Report) that points you to some other good articles on the web. Here they are:
Here are all of the other articles:
- Another Way to Build Wealth – Use a Veterans Entrepreneur Program
- How to Get Hundreds or Thousands of Dollars Back from American Express
- Lessons to Learn from the Recent 10% Stock Market Decline
- Military Death Benefits – Beyond SGLI
- My Guest Post on Humble Dollar – The $121,500 Guestroom (this has been posted on MCCareer.org before)
- Recent Changes in the Thrift Savings Plan
- Simple Steps I Take to Protect My Credit and Identity
- Why are the TSP Investment Expenses So Low?
Navy Times Article – Navy Looking at Radical New Career Paths
Here’s the link:
SGLI Beneficiaries Remain in Place as Navy Transitions to New Online System
“Your SGLI coverage is still in place,” said Ann Stewart, director, Pay and Personnel Department, Navy Personnel Command. “Sailors who log into SOES for the first time will have to input their beneficiary information manually. That is why there is no information the first time you use the system. But rest assured, that that form you previously filled out to designate your SGLI beneficiaries remains valid, until you register with the SOES.”
The Navy announced the launch of online SGLI enrollment in NAVADMIN 085/17 in April 2017 as part of a Department of Defense and Veterans Administration joint effort, to allow active duty and eligible reserve and National Guard members to review their group and family coverage online. SOES is the online replacement for the paper form SGLI Election and Certificate, SGLV 8286. The new system eliminates unclear designations and missing or incomplete forms — problems identified with the paper-based system — and ensures all insurance holders receive the latest information about changes affecting their coverage.
The goal is for all Navy members to provide beneficiary name(s), share(s) of proceeds and certify their record with a digital signature by April 2018.
While the SOES enables active duty and eligible reserve members to manage their group and family coverage online, there are some Sailors who shouldn’t use the system. Sailors who already have a testamentary trust or a testamentary custodial account created by a Regional Legal Service Office (RLSO) attorney should not use SOES to update their SGLI designations. Sailors with a testamentary trust or a testamentary custodial account who have registered with SOES should see their RLSO to reinstate their trust and/or account. Sailors interested in creating a testamentary trust or a testamentary custodial account should also see their RLSO and not use the SOES.
Here’s how to input beneficiary information in SOES:
1. Visit www.dmdc.osd.mil/milconnect.
2, Sign into milConnect on this page with your command access card (CAC). The green button is located in the upper right corner.
3. After signing in, you will be sent back to the milConnect front page. The menu bar will now display multiple options, one of which is ‘BENEFITS.’
4. Click on the ‘BENEFITS’ drop-down menu and click on ‘LIFE INSURANCE (SOES-SGLI Online Enrollment System).’
5. On the following page, scroll down to the blue continue button and click it (you may have to do so twice).
6. The following page provides you with your current Defense Eligibility Enrollment System (DEERS) information that must be verified. When finished reviewing, click continue.
7. The following page is where you can make your beneficiary selections. If this is your first time logging in, you will not see any beneficiary information listed. This does not mean you are not covered. You remain covered if you have previously filled out and signed an SGLI paper form. Please input your beneficiary selections into SOES.
8. After making your selections, click on the ‘YOUR COVERAGE’ tab and select the blue ‘CONFIRM AND CERTIFY’ button in the bottom right.
9. The next screen will ask you to make some legal declarations. Review and check the appropriate boxes and click ‘CONTINUE.’
10. You will be asked if you want to print a preview of the document. This is an uncertified copy for review. A certified copy is available at the end of the process. Click to continue.
11. Next, you will be asked for an electronic signature. Provide your full name and email address and click to continue.
12. The system will provide you an effective date for your SGLI election.
13. Print or email your certified document by navigating to the “Print/Save Certificate” tab.
For more information, take the online training course available at: www.benefits.va.gov/INSURANCE/training/SOES/SOES.htm
More information about SGLI can be found at the following links: www.npc.navy.mil/support/casualty/fsgli/Pages/default.aspx.
http://www.public.navy.mil/bupers-npc/reference/messages/Documents/NAVADMINS/NAV2017/NAV17085.txt
For more information, visit www.navy.mil, www.facebook.com/usnavy, or www.twitter.com/usnavy.
For more news from Chief of Naval Personnel, visit www.navy.mil/local/cnp/.
Military Times Article – Personnel Bosses are Latest to Weigh in on Limiting Military Moves
Here’s the link to an interesting article on Military Times:
Personnel Bosses are Latest to Weigh in on Limiting Military Moves
Military Times Article – Deploy or Get Out
Here’s an interesting read from Military Times:
Deploy or get out: New Pentagon plan could boot thousands of non-deployable troops
The 90% CAPT Promotion Opportunity and a Promotion Board Math Review
People are very excited about the 90% promotion opportunity for the recently concluded FY19 Staff Corps O6 promotion board. But it is easy to misinterpret this opportunity. It does not mean that 90% of CDRs will be selected for CAPT. Let’s review promotion board math…
Where Does the Promotion Opportunity Come From?
The short answer is from manpower projections. How many physicians are getting out or retiring? What is the current Medical Corps manning level for that rank? What are future needs anticipated to be? What is the size of the promotion zone?
The answers to all of these questions determines the promotion opportunity and guides PERS and BUMED when they are making their decision.
As you can see here, the promotion opportunity varies from year-to-year:
| FY13 | FY14 | FY15 | FY16 | FY17 | FY18 | FY19 | |
| LCDR | 100% | 100% | 100% | 100% | 100% | 100% | |
| CDR | 80% | 80% | 70% | 70% | 65% | 75% | |
| CAPT | 60% | 60% | 60% | 50% | 70% | 80% | 90% |
Historical promotion opportunities for FY13-19.
But as you can see here, the percentage who are promoted from the in zone group is substantially lower:
| FY13 | FY14 | FY15 | FY16 | FY17 | FY18 | FY19 | |
| LCDR | 97% | 89% | 90% | 93% | 88% | 85% | |
| CDR | 58% | 66% | 49% | 53% | 44% | 40% | |
| CAPT | 55% | 43% | 47% | 39% | 34% | 37% |
Historical percentage of in-zone candidates selected for promotion for FY13-18.
FY19 O6 Promotion Board Math
The FY19 lineal list shows that there are 74 CDRs in the FY19 zone. If you take the 90% promotion opportunity and multiply it by 74, you’ll see that they could have promoted 67 CDRs to O6 during the board:
90% opportunity X 74 people in zone = 66.6 (rounded up to 67) people they can pick for O6
These 67, though, could have been picked from CDRs who were below zone, in zone, or above zone. Usually, there is one person picked from below zone, and a number from the in zone and above zone categories. The exact mix won’t be known until they release the results in May.
The Bottom Line
I’d much rather have a 90% promotion opportunity for O6 than the 50% in FY16, but the actual percentage of CDRs who were picked from this year’s zone won’t be known until May. If I had to guess, the 90% promotion opportunity will lead to approximately 40% of those in zone being selected, but my guess could be way off. We’ll just have to wait and see.
FY19 O6 Promotion Board Members Released
PERS always releases the members of the promotion boards. They used to do it as soon as the board started, but after the E-9 board had to be cancelled last year they now do it after the board is over. Here are the members of this year’s O6 board:
90% Medical Corps Promotion Opportunity for FY19 O6 Board
Here is the FY19 O6 Promotion Board Convening Order, which was just released on this website. On page 2 you can see that the promotion opportunity is 90% for Medical Corps, the highest it has ever been in recent times:
Historical Promotion Opportunities for Medical Corps
| FY13 | FY14 | FY15 | FY16 | FY17 | FY18 | FY19 | |
| LCDR | 100% | 100% | 100% | 100% | 100% | 100% | |
| CDR | 80% | 80% | 70% | 70% | 65% | 75% | |
| CAPT | 60% | 60% | 60% | 50% | 70% | 80% | 90% |
Joel Schofer's Career Planning Blog 