Congress is on the verge of approving a 4.1 percent average pay raise for federal employees in 2003. But it will still be a few months before federal employees know exactly how much of a raise they will get in January. The House and Senate appropriations committees have each approved versions of the 2003 Treasury-Postal appropriations bill that would order the Bush administration to give federal employees an average 4.1 percent pay raise. In its 2003 budget proposal in February, the Bush administration had proposed a 2.6 percent raise. But many members of Congress, including Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., wanted the civilian pay raise to match the military pay raise, which will be 4.1 percent next year. Now that each of the appropriations committees has approved versions of the Treasury bill, each house must now pass the bill following floor debates, during which members can introduce amendments to the bill. Then members from each house will meet together in a conference committee to iron out differences in the two houses' versions of the bill. Once the committee reaches an agreement, each house will then pass a final version of the bill. Then President Bush will need to sign the bill. Under the formula for federal pay raises established in law, federal employees are due an across-the-board increase of 3.1 percent in January. If President Bush doesn't want to stick with that figure, then he can issue a statement by Sept. 1 announcing a plan to give employees a different across-the-board increase. Last year, Bush didn't issue an alternate across-the-board raise plan, even though he wanted a smaller raise for federal workers than what members of Congress wanted. Once the across-the-board increase is set, Bush will have to decide how to divvy up the remaining portion of the average raise via locality-based raises. Employees are due additional increases, depending on where they work, under the locality-based system of federal pay rates. Bush has to make a decision on locality-based raises by the end of November. Then he has to issue the 2003 federal pay tables before the end of the year. Chances are, once Congress approves the 4.1 percent average raise, Bush will approve a 3.1 percent across-the-board increase and then divvy up the remaining 1 percent in locality-based increases. In January, federal employees received an average 2002 pay raise of 4.6 percent. Actual raises ranged from 4.52 percent in Kansas City, Mo., and Orlando, Fla., to 5.42 percent in San Francisco. The Bush administration didn't issue the 2002 pay tables until Dec. 29 last year. Some federal employees complained about the pay tables coming out so late in December because they wanted to know their 2002 salaries before determining how much to contribute to their Thrift Savings Plan accounts each paycheck. Employees could change their TSP contribution levels during the Thrift Savings Plan open season, which ran Nov. 15 to Jan. 31, but only changes submitted before the end of December tookeffect at the beginning of January. This year, the TSP open season will run from Oct. 15 to Dec. 31.