2.  The applicant requests that she be paid the remainder of her Selected Reserve Incentive Program (SRIP) bonus or, in the alternative, that the SRIP payment she has already received not be collected back from her.

3.  The applicant states that she completed a valid enlistment contract containing a SRIP addendum for a $5,000.00 SRIP bonus.  She was later denied her SRIP bonus installment payments and told that the one SRIP payment she had already received would be collected back from her.

4.  In support of her application she submits a memorandum from her commander in which her commander recommended that the applicant be paid her entire $5,000.00 SRIP bonus.  Her commander stated that the applicant is a single parent with three small children and she would experience a great hardship if she were made to repay the bonus payment that she has already received.

5.  The applicant’s military records show that she enlisted in the Regular Army on 21 March 1984, was awarded the military occupational specialty (MOS) of food service specialist, reenlisted, was promoted to pay grade E-5, and was released from active duty on 26 May 1991 at the expiration of her term of service.

6.  In conjunction with her release from active duty, on 25 May 1991 she enlisted for 6 years in the USAR for assignment to a troop program unit.  As part of that contract she completed a DA Form 5261-5-R-E, Selected Reserve Incentive Program - Prior Service Enlistment Bonus Addendum, in which she was promised a $5,000.00 SRIP skill bonus which was to be paid to her in an initial payment of $2,500.00 and the remainder in six increments of $416.66 upon the satisfactory completion of each year of her enlistment.

7.  On 16 June 1993 the applicant’s unit commander submitted a pay inquiry on the failure of the applicant to be given her bonus payment.  The unit’s finance and accounting office responded that the applicant’s MOS was not approved for a SRIP bonus, that she would not receive any future bonus installment payments, and that collection action would be initiated for the bonus payment she had already received.

8.  Army Regulation l35-7 authorizes a $5,000.00 SRIP bonus for prior service members who have completed their statutory military service obligation but who have less than 10 years of total service and enlist or reenlist in a USAR unit for 6 years in either a critical MOS or a critical unit, as designated by the Department of the Army.

CONCLUSIONS:

1.	The applicant was promised a SRIP bonus, in writing. Therefore, she would have reasonably expected to receive that bonus.  However, that skill was not bonus eligible at the time of her reenlistment.

2.	An obvious error was made by recruiting personnel, an error that apparently persuaded the applicant to enlist.

3.  Through no fault of her own, the applicant has been denied a financial gain for which she was told she was qualified to receive.  To deny her this benefit under these circumstances would not be in the interest of justice.

4.	In view of the foregoing, it would be in the interest of justice to correct the applicant’s records as recommended below.

RECOMMENDATION:

That all of the Department of the Army records related to this case be corrected:

	a.	by showing that the individual concerned was entitled to a $5,000.00 SRIP skill bonus for MOS 94B; and

	b.	by refunding to her any interest or penalties that she was paid as a result of her indebtedness for the erroneous SRIP payment.

BOARD VOTE:  

                       GRANT AS STATED IN RECOMMENDATION

                       GRANT FORMAL HEARING

                       DENY APPLICATION




		                           
		        CHAIRPERSON