Pay-tience
Federal employees anxious to see that extra 1 percent pay raise must first wait for the gears of government to finish grinding.
The Bush administration has yet to make a decision about how to allocate the higher retroactive pay raise granted to civil service employees for 2003 in the omnibus spending bill passed last week by Congress, meaning it may be some time before federal employees see more cash in their paychecks.
The final version of the omnibus legislation included a 4.1 percent pay raise for federal employees, retroactive to the first pay period of 2003. Last fall the Bush administration approved a 3.1 percent across-the-board pay raise, with no increase in locality-based pay. Federal workers in 31 metropolitan areas, ranging from Atlanta and Washington to Huntsville, Ala., get special locality pay, based on the cost of labor in each city. Outside the 31 areas, federal workers in the 48 contiguous states are covered by the "Rest of the U.S." locality pay category.
Office of Personnel Management officials said Wednesday that the President's Pay Agent, a council made up of officials at the Office of Management and Budget, the Labor Department and OPM, had yet to decide whether the additional 1 percent granted by the omnibus legislation will be added to the across-the-board portion of the pay raise or be given to federal workers for locality pay. The council will send its recommendation to President Bush, who will then issue an executive order declaring how the raise will be allocated.
Until all of that is ironed out, paychecks for civil service employees will remain the same.
Relocation Reimbursement
On Wednesday the General Services Administration published the formulas needed to calculate relocation income tax allowances in the Federal Register.
The relocation income tax allowance (RITA) reimburses federal travelers for federal, state and local income taxes incurred while relocating. When federal employees file reimbursement vouchers for moving costs, taxes are withheld because the Internal Revenue Service treats the money as income. Employees must file claims with their agencies to get the withheld money back, and the agency calculates the tax allowance using the RITA tables.
The tables are updated annually to reflect changes in the federal, state and Puerto Rican income tax brackets and tax rates. The RITA tax table numbers became effective Jan. 1, 2003.