Changes in Special Rate Program Possible

OPM has told agencies to review the "special rate" pay they grant in certain occupations and locations, an annual process in which agencies decide whether they need to continue that higher pay or whether it needs to be raised or lowered. In general, agencies need to make recommendations only if they want raises for those employees to be other than what GS employees stand to receive in January, which most likely will be a 2.9 percent across-the-board raise plus 1 percentage point divided up as locality pay; special rate employees get the higher of their special rate adjustment or the area’s locality pay adjustment, but not both. In one potential change, OPM told agencies to review the concept of splitting up national special rate schedules into one covering the contiguous 48 states plus the District of Columbia and another covering non-foreign areas. For worldwide schedules, there would be those two schedules plus another for foreign areas.