INQUIRY 18-02, Federal Employees Health Benefits (FEHB) and Federal Employees Group Life Insurance (FEGLI) Leave without Pay (LWOP) Counters
Published: October 16, 2018
Summary
This bulletin is being issued to provide information for tracking non-pay status, thereby improving the accuracy of Federal Employees Group Life Insurance (FEGLI) and Federal Employees Health Benefits (FEHB) enrollment terminations, and assisting Agencies in identifying opportunities to reenroll in FEHB/FEGLI programs upon return to duty.
Employees with Civilian Time in Non-Pay Status
Civilian (non-military) non-pay time is documented on an employee's T&A or via a personnel action. Whenever a full pay period of non-pay time is indicated by (1) no T&A submitted or (2) a T&A with only non-pay time for the entire pay period is submitted, the Payroll/Personnel System (PPS) records a full 14 days of non-pay time and updates the following FEHB and FEGLI information on the IRIS Program IR140 screen:
- FEGLI Begin Date - Populated with the date corresponding with the beginning of the pay period in which the FEGLI Termination counter begins. This date remains the same until the FEGLI Termination counter is reset (when the Pay Status after AWOP FEGLI reaches 120).
- FEGLI Pay Status after AWOP - Updates whenever an employee who has time captured in the FEGLI Termination field actually receives pay.
- FEGLI Termination - Captures the number of non-pay days toward the 365-day FEGLI limitation. This number is updated in increments of 14 days. This number should only reset once the Pay Status AWOP FEGLI field reaches 120 days. Non-pay only counts for the FEGLI termination counter if the employee receives no pay during a pay period in which they are enrolled in the benefit.
- FEHB Begin Date - Populated with the date corresponding to the beginning of the pay period in which the FEHB Termination counter begins. This date remains the same until the FEHB Termination counter is reset (when the Pay Status after AWOP field reaches 120).
- FEHB Pay Status after AWOP - Updates whenever an employee who has time captured in the FEHB Termination field actually receives pay.
- FEHB Termination - Captures the number of non-pay days toward the 365-day FEHB limitation. This number is updated in increments of 14 days. This number only resets once the Pay Status after AWOP field reaches 120 days. Non-pay only counts for the FEHB termination counter if the employee receives no pay during a pay period in which they are enrolled in the benefit.
- Non Pay Counters - If a T&A resulting in any paid time is submitted for an employee who is in documented non-pay status, this time is counted as pay time and does not update the FEHB or FEGLI non-pay counter (i.e., if a T&A is submitted with a combination of pay and non-pay time, PPS captures this scenario as 14 days of pay, and this is reflected in the Pay Status after AWOP for FEHB and/or Pay Status after AWOP for FEGLI counter).
Employees on Military Furlough
Military furlough is always documented via a personnel action. The non-pay time is not broken by periods of intermittent pay while absent (i.e., non-pay time continues to accrue regardless of whether or not employees receive sick, annual, military leave, or holiday pay while absent). For employees on military furlough, the following FEHB fields found on IRIS Program IR140 screen are updated:
- FEHB MIL Begin Date - Reflects the effective date of the personnel action that placed the employee in a current military furlough status. Resets to zero when a return to duty personnel action is processed.
- FEHB Term Mil - Captures the number of military furlough days toward the 730-day FEHB limitation. This number is updated in increments of 14 days per processing pay period, unless the FEHB Mil Begin Date is within the current processing pay period, in which case the FEHB Term Mil counter increments by the number of days spanned by the FEHB Mil Begin Date thru the end of the current processing pay period. Resets to zero when a return to duty personnel action is processed.
Resources
The procedure manuals for these applications, which are available online at the National Finance Center (NFC) Web site, are being updated to include the information in this bulletin. To view and/or print these procedures, select HR and Payroll Clients from the MyNFC drop-down menu on the NFC homepage. At the HR and Payroll Clients page, select the Publications tab and select the applicable category to access the procedure manuals within the category.
Inquiries
For questions about NFC processing, authorized Servicing Personnel Office representatives should contact the NFC Contact Center at
or via the ServiceNow Customer Service Portal.