Members of the 21st Theater Sustainment Command work to process soldiers arriving at Ramstein Air Base, Germany, via the Patriot Express on Feb. 7, 2012. A congressional watchdog in 2025 has recommended that the Defense Department overhaul the reimbursement system for permanent change of station moves to cut back on delays. (Michael Taylor/U.S. Army)
The Defense Department should overhaul the financial system behind permanent change of station moves that send U.S. troops from one base to the next, a congressional watchdog agency said in a recent report.
The Army and Marine Corps were late reimbursing many service members for military moves over a three-year period ending in fiscal year 2023, the Government Accountability Office said Wednesday.
The GAO recommended that the Defense Department clarify reimbursement timelines in its financial management regulations and that the Army and Marines create offices to monitor and fix reimbursement delays, the report said.
More than 400,000 service members completed a PCS move to a new duty station in 2024, the report said.
Delayed PCS reimbursements were cited as a financial stressor associated with suicide risk for service members in a January 2023 report by the government’s Suicide Prevention and Response Independent Review Committee.
“You used to have the finance person sit down with you and complete your travel form from your PCS, but now it’s online and it gets kicked back,” an unnamed officer said in the suicide prevention report. “You no longer have that [subject matter expert] or someone that knows this job helping you and guiding you through that stuff.”
Navy Capt. Sean Andrews, commanding officer of the Naval Supply Systems Command’s Fleet Logistics Center Pearl Harbor, observes household goods about to be shipped from a local agent in Honolulu on April 3, 2025, in support of permanent change of station peak season preparedness. The Government Accountability Office has recommended the Defense Department overhaul the PCS reimbursement system for the Army and Marine Corps following delays. (Wesley Burgos/U.S. Navy)
Of 586,417 Army PCS voucher reimbursements, 40,798, or 7%, were paid after 30-day deadline set under DOD financial rules, the report said.
The Marine Corps has a much stricter reimbursement policy of 10 business days. Reimbursements were late 9.7% of time, or 17,134 out of 176,216 cases, though only 0.6% missed the Pentagon’s 30-day deadline.
The delayed reimbursement funds totaled $139 million for the Army, and $47 million for the Marines, the report said. The Army paid most reimbursements within the following 30-day window, and the Marine Corps typically paid within 20 business days.
Officials from both branches blamed multiple offices being involved in the process and staffing shortages, especially during the busy summer months.
The GAO was directed to investigate delayed PCS reimbursements for the Army and Marine Corps in a House report attached to the 2024 National Defense Authorization Act.
In its rebuttal, the Defense Department argued that a new Marine Corps office was unnecessary because the service generally operates within the 30-day window. The DOD concurred with the other recommendations.
