More Waiting Ahead

If the 2003 raise is set at 4.1 percent retroactive, it likely would be several weeks afterward until agency payroll systems could be revised to make retroactive payments and to set new pay rates for the remainder of the year. The extra percentage point of salary likely would be divided up as locality pay, meaning that raises would vary by locality from 4.87 percent in the San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose locality to 4.02 percent in the “rest of the U.S.” locality, the catchall locality for areas outside the designated metropolitan zones.