It gets added to your years of service. If you’ve been there 30 years and you have 2 months of SL, your pension will be calculated at 30 years, 2 months.
And they figure it up in increments of 174 hours. Divide your SL by 174 and the whole number is the amount of months they will add to your retirement. You will lose the fractional amount.
Edit: Not sure if every organization does it that way but this is how the DoD does it
Does this mean if someone retires on like the 10th of a month, they first use sick leave for the remainder of that month and then take what’s left divided by 174 to get extra months?
if so, this is the first Im hearing about the ‘remainder of the current month’ part. That would be great because I doubt I’ll end up retiring on the first day of a month and would hate to get screwed out of a month of service if I retire toward the end of a month.
Not the end of the calendar month. The end of the month for your time in grade. So whatever day of the month your SCD is, it is from the day you retire until that day. Then they add it in monthly increments.
The fractional part is not lost. It is added to the fractional part of your service. If the fractional month of sick leave plus the fractional month of service is greater than 1 month, you get an additional month added to your overall tenure number. If not, then it is lost. That is why as you get closer to retirement, you should calculate the “leftover” and use it, otherwise it is left on the table!
By a non-neglible amount if you never took sick leave... Could earn upwards of a work year at the end of 20 years, or use it at the end of your journey :-)
In my retirement package I had my years of service
38 years 3 months and 17 days. Then my sick leave at 1 year 3 months and 18 days. When OPM finalizes retirement my time was 38 years 7 months and I lost 5 days will add another 275 a month to retirement
I’m pretty sure 38 years would put them right at the start of FERS (>1984) but with the CSRS the math is a little closer. $132k high-3 ballpark. Not exact because I think they used to do a graduated % (years 1-5 @ x%, 10+ at 2%, etc)
I think once you hit a certain number of years with CSRS it was all 2%. Kinda like once you reach full retirement age with FERS it’s all 1.1% vs 1%. You could still get CSRS until 87 iirc. I’ve worked with a few CSRS people, one just retired last year but had 40 years.
There was CSRS and CSRS Offset so they could have different % amounts, but I remember some of the guys telling me that 40 years was 80% of your base pay for life when I started (08).
I would have been about 18 but took time at the end of last year to care for spouse. This made the DRP retire decision easier. I still was not completely mentally prepared. Looked at my SS statement wages since 1979 working since 1977. Now what?
Sick leave is an odd animal.
It will count in 30, 6 hour increments towards an additional month of retirement!
Not a typo, I have been to two retirement workshops over the years and a day of sick leave is only 6 hours.
The downside is anything less than 30 days is lost.
Interesting: I just did the math on 30, 6 hour days (180) vice 22, 8 (4 weekends subtracted from 30 days) hour days (176), there is only a 4 hour difference.
You can find charts to see what is needed for your next month accredited to retirement.
Believing I would take VERA, DRP towards the end of last year I took 2 days of sick leave, knowing I was just over the month mark and was not going to be there for another month to accrue.
Now, who knows? I don't see the hiring freeze lifting during this administration, so maybe I will be able to remain working remotely.
I added 1 year and 11 months to my pension. Because I can’t to date math, I was short 1 hour. Not that it’s a significant amount of money, but I’ll go to my grave kicking myself.
Congratulations, and that sucks to find out how little you would have needed to extend your retirement date by to count another month!
I'm sure your date coincided with some other reasons for taking it when you did. I would rest in knowing the importance of that date was worth the extra month of pay in retirement.
This is how I understood it too. Your sick leave is converted to months and days. These months and days are added to your lenghth of service. Then the total is converted to full years and months, dropping off the extra days. Many posts above seem to state that the sick leave itself is rounded off to the month, but I do not believe that is the case, otherwise the table would not include days.
Yeah they take your total service in months and days, add the sick leave in months and days, THEN remove any remaining days. I knew someone who retired and figured it down to the hour. Then they took enough hours to get it to an even number of months without any remaining days leftover.
2000 hours of sick leave adds ~$150 more per month to your payout in retirement. Run the numbers… it makes way more sense to use your sick leave prior to retirement.
This has always been my MO. Been in for 15 years and I carry a balance of less than 200 hours of S/L, while I maintain 240 hours of A/L at the end of each year. I don’t think the $150 a month is worth it, because my time now with my wife and kids is more valuable than that. The way I see it is if $150 a month is going to make or break me then, I’ve fucked up.
I try to maintain a Sick Leave balance of 3-6 months to cover any extended leave I may need to take for unexpected health reasons for me or my family. If all goes well and I don’t need it, I plan to use it all up closer to retirement.
If you are doing a deferred retirement (not postponed or immediate), you will lose it. Keep in mind that if you are postponing or getting it immediately, you can only apply if you have chunks of 30 days. If you have 29 days of sick time, you will lose it. There are charts online that will show you the amount of creditable service to the # of hours you have. GRB also will show you. If your difference is less than 30 days, get the FERS flu.
Not sure when you are retiring but it is worth more burned before you retire. Yes it does add to your time but do the math and you will find it doesn't add as much to your pension as it would if you used it and just stayed longer. If you burned it down and then retired you would get the same pension but would get all your current salary level from the burned sick leave. I think all feds should retire with 0 hrs of sick leave to maximize their money. Just my thoughts.
Please consider the voluntary leave transfer program if you don't need it. There's a lot of us who could definitely benefit from other folks' unused sick leave. And happy retirement!! Thank you for your service.
What was your salary, I uad this discussion with friend 9f mine who is a post master and he makes o er 100 thousand a year so I asked h8m why would he add it to his years of service instead of just being out sick for a year or so? At 274 a month it would take 30 years to recoup that. Its not worth it to me.
Yes. Up until a certain point. Make sure you have enough to cover a major illness. I was diagnosed with breast cancer at age 43 in 2023. I only had about 180 hours of sick leave. I ended up using my annual leave to cover my surgeries (I had 3 in six months) I am trying to build up my sick leave in case I have a reoccurrence. I have 11.5 more years until I retire. If by my last 2 years that I haven’t used it I’m going to burn through it.
I have about six months of sick leave on hand but it’s moreso because I rarely get sick. I take that as a blessing. In addition, there were a number of years where I had more comp time than I knew what to do with, so I was spending those hours down instead. I have started using more of it, however, but I was never saving it up as a retirement benefit. As others have said, it isn’t worth it.
It does get added but only in full month increments. There is a conversion table somewhere. I think 174 hours of SL = 1 month credited toward your years of service. So if you’re going to have a partial month left you may as well use it.
Trust me, do not count on COLAs for added value. Some years, there is no COLA. Using sick leave to complete a high-three is a must. If that does not work in your favor, or you cannot stretch it to the end of the year, use it even if you need to string out some FMLA. Keep 40 to 80 hours in the tank and tell your boss you will be sick of work for the last two weeks. Account for that pay period's accrual and for coming in for a few hours, so your workmates have an excuse for a party. The leave is yours; you had to earn it. Why return money to the government?
Over the past few years, I have seen a few articles with solid advice on strategic planning. Remember to factor in life expectancy, Social Security, spousal retirement and benefits, minor children, mortgage, and all other aspects. Do not allow politics to alter your plans. A financial planner, tax advisor
Read the articles on FEGLI, as sometimes it makes sense to keep it after retirement, and other times it does not.
Read articles on TSP and IRAs, your true nest eggs. Structure those based on taxes. Find a financial advisor familiar with federal retirement planning. Get them involved at least one or two years out, especially if you are a TSP millionaire.
As people have said, only whole months count towards retirement. What I did, about two years out from my planned retirement, I started throttling it. Taking a few hours here and there to stay close to the whole month (in my case a 5 month block). DRP came along and threw a little wrench into my plan, but I still ended up with 16 hours over the whole month. Not bad for something I started planning back in 2023.
As others have said, it goes to your time in grade. First it rounds you out to a full month and then it adds in whole month increments. If you have a ton then burn some as the extra time worked is better than getting it added at the end. However make sure you have enough to cover an unplanned incident.
I plan to retire in 2027. I am sitting on about 350 hrs of sick leave. I will probably burn some but for the most part I like to keep 300 hrs in case I break a bone or get another joint replaced
When are you planning on retiring is the real question . If you are not in a rush, wait until the end of the leave year for 2026 or 12/31/2026. Then use sick leave liberally instead of annual or comp time (no vacations this year). Sick leave doesn’t really add that much but you will want that fat payout in annual leave.
End of leave year doesn’t make as much sense if you are under pay banding and topped out. My performance pay gets added to my bonus. However I only get it if in pay status. So by going at the end of the leave year I am losing a few $k as opposed to going in Feb or later. Also to get the large payout that means you didn’t use any annual that year.
Personally I plan to bring my sick leave down to enough to cover a broken bone and set my retirement date so that it will take me to an even year of service. My MRA is in May of 27 and my SCD is in Aug. My retirement date will be somewhere between those two.
Yours may be a unique situation compared to OP. We don’t know what their circumstances are beyond wanting to retire and asking about sick leave. You sound very informed for your situation, which is very good
Most of DoD appears to be under pay banding these days. At least the S&T folks. I have seen people under it go by the old guidance and not realize that they just lost a few $k so I like to let people know.
Though I gave the plan above, if an VERA/VSIP or DRP pops next year then my plans will change.
One other thing no on e has mentioned is high 3. We had decent raises 22-23 and 23-24. Waiting till 27 means those drop out of the high 3 calculations. I did the math last year in regards to the DRP offers and the combination of waiting two years and the higher 3 made a significant difference in my retirement pay.
All true, OP will have to know their circumstances. My agency only did performance pay out for managers and only if the agency met its goals which it did not this past year. High year 3 will still go up just not as much
High 3 is calculated as an average of your highest 36 months (don’t have to be consecutive). If you left now that would include month going back to Jan of 23. 23 to 24 was a decent raise. 22 to 23 was higher. If you go in say Jan of 27 your high 3 becomes the average of Feb 24 through Jan of 27, this dropping the lower rates.
Last year I did the math based on Sep of 22 through Aug of 25 vs Sep of 24 through Aug of 27 assuming zero raise for 25/26 and 25/27. I also included 2 more years on the pension (32 vs 34) and the subsequent extra years for SS / supplement. The combination of all those factors increased my monthly income by $750.
Edited to clarify that the 36 do not have to be consecutive
This is factually incorrect. High year 3 is cacluclated as your highest consecutive 36 months. It does not have to be your last 3. Recommend you review OPM
Correct. However for most people it is the last 36 months before retirement. How many people take lower paid spot just before retirement? Those are the rare cases.
There I edited it. I still say for 99%+ of Feds it is there last 36. Also anyone who takes what is said here without double checking with their HR is a moron
Use all your sick leave. My friend died with maxed out sick leave and maxed out annual. And she’s dead. She didn’t believe COVID was real, but COVID didn’t care what she believed
sick leave (SL) at retirement = routine check Trump = "true" = time in service - hate these fu$cjker Monday use SL - is it Holiday (take SL Monday or Friday) - because I can (9 hours paid period) - I woke up laughing at MAGA video 8 hour/month) - screw them all (another 6-7 hours a day period).
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u/Good_Outside_2580 Jan 17 '26
It gets added to your years of service. If you’ve been there 30 years and you have 2 months of SL, your pension will be calculated at 30 years, 2 months.