This story was first published at 4:39 p.m. EST February 26, 2016
A congressionally authorized program that provides special incentives to enlisted soldiers who extend their overseas tours by 12 months or more has been placed in cold storage by the Army.
Acting Army Secretary Patrick Murphy will not approve the inclusion of any military occupational specialties or geographical locations to the Overseas Tour Extension Incentive Program, according to a notice issued Feb. 24.
"There are no active or projected MOS or geographic locations (for OTEIP) in the foreseeable future," according to the announcement.
Since the inclusion of OTEIP in federal law nearly 40 years ago, the program has been authorized for soldiers in select MOSs serving in Germany, South Korea, Japan, Alaska and other overseas locations outside major combat zones.
When authorized, OTEIP has featured a menu of incentives, including special pay, special leave, travel entitlements and lump-sum bonuses. Soldiers who met the specialty requirements, and who extended their overseas tours by at least 12 months, were eligible for one of the following benefits:
- Special pay of $80 per month during the period of extension.
- 30 days of non-chargeable leave.
- 15 days of non-chargeable leave, and free transportation of the soldier (but no family members) to the nearest stateside port.
- Annual $2,000 lump-sum bonus.
During the period of heavy deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army used OTEIP to reduce assignment turbulence and improve the personnel readiness of overseas units outside the combat zones.
In recent years, participation in the program has been sharply curtailed. For example, in fiscal 2015 the Army provided OTEIP benefits to 27 soldiers at a total cost of $54,000.
Budget projections submitted to Congress in early February indicated the Army would limit OTEIP benefits to no more than nine soldiers in 2016.
Pentagon personnel officials emphasize that two programs similar to OTEIP remain in effect for overseas commands.
Those are the In-Place Overseas Tour Extension (IPCOT) and Assignment Incentive Pay (AIP) programs.
"The Overseas Tour Incentive Program is sometimes confused with IPCOT and AIP, which are guided by different sections (of federal law and Defense Department Instructions), and that most overseas commands use to incentivize keeping soldiers in place for readiness purposes," according to a statement provided by the Office of the Army G1 (chief of human resources).
While the Army is authorized to use OTEIP as an incentive for certain enlisted soldiers to extend their overseas tours, the program will remain in inactive status, as it has been since 2007.
"We do not need OTEIP to preserve readiness in overseas units," according to the G1 statement.
