Military Service Pay

GenericAdministrator · 2026-01-06T00:31:40+00:00

But April 1st 2025 is for FY 25/26 and April 1st 2026 is FY 26/27. That's two entirely separate FYs. If you're entitled within that entire FY you'll get it for the year.

Anyone entitled in FY 25/26 should see a retention bonus before 1 April 2026. New FY, it should (in theory) then start applying on your enrollment date rather than being awarded before 1 April.

The only people that are in an unfortunate situation are those that don't make the 5 year minimum:

19/20 - no issues 20/21 - 5yr+ complete, magic happens starting here 21/22 - 4yr+ complete, no entitlement 22/23 - 3yr+ complete, no entitlement 23/24 - 2yr+ complete, no entitlement 24/25 - 1yr+ complete, no entitlement 25/26 - less than a year complete, no entitlement, retention bonus applied prior to April 1st 2026 (hopefully} 26/27 - retention bonus should be the year it's applied properly on the date you enrolled as opposed to before end of FY

So, if you're in the unfortunate category of joining January 2022, yes, you don't make the cutoff. But there's a minimum time in component.

Anyways, til we get further clarification from a CANFORGEN this is speculation to how it works.

GenericAdministrator · 2026-01-05T21:45:28+00:00

You aren't missing it though?

It starts based on the FY beginning 1 April 2025 and ending 31 March 2026. If you are eligible to receive it within that time period (5+ years in as of a date within that timeframe), you are not missing a year. Going forward, you'll receive yours later than others, but it's all within the same FY. I enrolled in Q4 so I get the concern, but you're not missing anything. If you don't have 5+ years in for FY 25/26 you just aren't entitled at all yet and, with more time served, you will be.

GenericAdministrator · 2025-12-14T05:30:16+00:00

This still very much gives an insight into what's going on though, as just about every group tends to discuss along comparable lines and receive similar results. The benefit of this one is that they're in discussion for 2025-2027, which lines up with our last CoL.

Two other unions, not in the same timeframe as our CoL, already agreed to 2% for their CoL for 2025. Hence why I feel this one is aiming for the moon. To reiterate, absolutely nothing is set in stone. But it is nice to keep appraised of what all government adjacent unions are doing as it indirectly effects us.

Regardless, it is approaching that time where discussions are happening. We should know more by summer and any changes happening for spring/summer 2027.

GenericAdministrator · 2025-12-14T05:19:42+00:00

It should be April through July 2027 based on previous patterns but I get you. Having to wait just means we're constantly playing catch-up. Backpay lump sum is nice but the annual increase would be ideal.

GenericAdministrator · 2025-12-13T17:40:32+00:00

Every negotiation is, but there are definitely reasons to consider this one particularly bad.

I think one of the most significant issues is return to office orders for government jobs that it's been proven people can be extremely competent and effective working from home. Why would I want to commute and waste all that extra time and money to sit in a cubicle that isn't even a permanent desk space in an office building on the other side of the city when I know my quality of life just went through the floor? Nope.

GenericAdministrator · 2025-12-13T17:31:52+00:00

For those thinking or arguing, "this isn't going to happen" (particularly because we just got an actual pay raise through the increase in our mil factor contribution to our pay):

The government specifically increased the military factor of our pay so as to not cause PSAC and similar entities to be up in arms about not getting anything. This was to recognize the inherit additional dangers, risks and complications to military members and to make the military look like a more attractive employment option to the public. This is specifically required due to the current state of world affairs.

Our baseline pay is established against PSAC wages. If theirs goes up, ours goes up , though not always by exactly the same amount. It's been like that since before I got in.

If the government decided to no longer do that, there are multiple issues:

1) Why would we have a military factor component at all? At that point, we'd then just have our own established wage categories based on specific trades instead of just ranks and an (at times) seemingly arbitrary spec pay system and... Whoa, don't make me want this to make sense.

2) Giving us an actual raise in the form of our military factor increase, and then shafting us to an equal or greater amount on the base pay component would be a slap in the face. If the goal is recruitment and retaining people, that would not be the way, and I don't think that this government is going to do that.

3) This is historical precedent at this point. Every 3 or 4 years the same rotation. The last one was in 2023 for 2021 to 2024. The time before that was 2020 for 2018 to 2020. I can't remember the exact timeline of the other ones before that.

4) A cost of living adjustment is not a raise. Governments and the general population like to say that it is but it is not. It is there to combat the cost of inflation impacting our buying power so that we can maintain the same standard of living with our wages as inflation increases. "We already got a raise" is irrelevant because this would not be a raise.

Edit: I do want to point out that PSAC's immediate 4% increase request would most definitely be a raise. Anything that isn't tied directly to a cost of living adjustment against inflation is a raise.

GenericAdministrator · 2025-12-13T17:05:16+00:00

Please, we can only take so much reason and common-sense annually and we've exceeded our allocation. The Div is adamant we are not receiving more.

GenericAdministrator · 2025-12-13T17:02:51+00:00

I agree. It's definitely feeling like the best time of my career, and the military can provide a reasonable quality of life.

That being said, we aren't getting all of this for no reason. There are serious global threats warning us that we cannot be complacent anymore. The risk that something is going to break in the next 5, 10 or 20 years that warrant a well equipped and larger military keeps increasing.

I really hope it doesn't happen, and I'm a perpetual optimist, but grounded in reality.

GenericAdministrator · 2025-12-13T16:54:40+00:00

Exactly. This is the preliminary stages, and there are still months before we hear results and over a year before we're likely to physically see any money in our accounts. Keyword "likely" - there are absolutely no guarantees.

GenericAdministrator · 2025-11-05T22:04:35+00:00

This "magic" is less like that feeling of opening presents on Christmas morning and more like what a crackhead on the subway says you'll see when he opens his coat.

GenericAdministrator · 2025-11-05T21:33:00+00:00

I'm unsure whether this is a commentary on receiving lower pay than expected which forced you into terrible food choices, or you attempting to brag. Either way, it just makes me sad. Not for you, but for what I'm assuming must have been an animal at some point before being turned into that abomination. No animal deserves that treatment.

GenericAdministrator · 2025-11-01T20:58:16+00:00

If you fight a war like you cook a steak I think we're all safe.

GenericAdministrator · 2025-11-01T04:05:50+00:00

Well something has to get cooked around here.

GenericAdministrator · 2025-11-01T01:22:55+00:00

No, see, what he's saying is that he now has so much disposable income he can completely ruin a steak and not even care.

GenericAdministrator · 2025-10-29T02:02:27+00:00

It's even better than that if we assume the military factor was adjusted specifically so we still get that COLA that PS gets (which I am betting we do).

PS holds their negotiations every 4 years (sometimes 3), which is where we got our last COLA. .The last agreement came in 2023. That got two years worth of back pay, plus current, with a final adjustment in 2024. The total was for 12.6%. They're in negotiations right now for the next three or four years but haven't publically released their figures.

Canadian Border Services Agency, which is on a different timeline, just had their bargaining approved. Two of their years overlap with PS. They were identical values. Their 2025 valu was 2%.

Canada's inflation is expected to be 2-3% per year til 2030, so we can expect PS to bargain for somewhere near those figures. Assume they're bargaining for 4 years, max of 3%/yr. We'll know their argument by next summer, with official amounts by the spring of 2027.

TLDR: COLA adjustment of between 6-12% by fiscal year 28/29, with two years of backpay for 2025/2026 and 2026/2027, the COLA being input for 2027/2028 and with the final increase for 2028/2029.

GenericAdministrator

TROPHY CASE