Does anyone know if an individual had never elected to participate in the MGIB at original enlistment, can they sign up for this new one?
Would they have to put up the $1200.
I was told (way back when)that if you turn down the MGIB at enlistment/boot camp, you missed the boat.
I never agreed with that thought as an 18 year old who hated school, why can't you change your mind 10 years later....even 20 years later.
Thoughts?

Yes you can get the new one without paying in, if you served after 9/11.

Check out

http://www.gibill2008.org/benefits.html

"Benefits Under the Post-9/11 Veterans Education Assistance Act
This new benefit will cover the full cost of education at any public school in the country and many private schools. To qualify for the benefits, a veteran has to have served at least 90 days of active duty post-9/11 and have remaining entitlement. Only post-9/11 active duty service counts toward this benefit. Any remaining Chapter 30 or 1607 entitlement can be converted into this new education benefit. There is no requirement to buy in to qualify, and the benefits last for 15 years after separation.

This benefit discards the outdated benefits system and replaces it with a WWIIstyle GI bill that provides upfront tuition payments directly to the school, and provides a book/supply stipend of $1,000 per year and a monthly living stipend. The tuition payments can be used at any public or private school but are capped at the cost of the most expensive public school in the state. Click here for a state-by-state breakdown. However, more expensive private schools offering a veterans-only scholarship will see that scholarship matched dollar for dollar up to the full cost of tuition.

The monthly living stipend will be based on the Department of Defense Basic Housing Allowance (BAH) for that region. The stipend will be pegged to the E-5 with a dependent rate for the zip code of the school."

JoJo

Does anyone else see how this post 9/11 GI Bill is detrimental to those of us who are coming up on retirement? I just read the second ALCOAST on this and it says that as of 01AUG2009 you must agree to serve an additional 4 years of active service to be able to transfer to dependents. How is that beneficial to those that have already served their time in the Guard and want to retire and pass this on to our kids?

not much benefit to this


G. TRANSFERABILITY: A MEMBER MAY HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO
TRANSFER BENEFITS TO THEIR SPOUSE OR DEPENDENT CHILDREN. MEMBERS
MUST BE ON ACTIVE DUTY AT THE TIME OF THIS ELECTION, MUST HAVE
SERVED SIX YEARS SINCE 9/11, AND MUST AGREE TO SERVE AN ADDITIONAL
FOUR YEARS OF ACTIVE SERVICE. DETAILED GUIDANCE IS BEING DEVELOPED
IN CONJUNCTION WITH DOD AND WILL BE RELEASED AHEAD OF THE AUGUST
2009 IMPLEMENTATION DATE.

Common sense should prevail and if your retirement eligible with 20 or more years you should qualify for the benefits. Just my opinion.

“17992297”, I think that you are correct in saying that if you have 20 years of service, you are eligible to use the benefit once you retire. I think the problem “patpatriot” is referring to is concerning those of us who are coming up on retirement and want to transfer the benefit to a dependant child. According to the ALCOAST message, the member would have to incur a four year commitment starting from the date the benefit is transferred to the dependant child. Basically, anyone with an active duty base date starting before 01 August 1993 is definitely affected by the four year service commitment if they wanted to retire at the 20 year mark.. Those who entered the service after 01 August 1993 will only have 16 years of service on 01 August 2009 so the 4 year commitment brings them to their 20 year retirement date.

The ALCOAST message states that a member must have 6 years of service after 9/11/2001 and commit for another 4 years for a total of 10 years to be eligible to transfer the benefit. I think it would be fair that once a member has 10 years of service after 9/11/2001, and is retiring from the military, they should be able to transfer the benefit to a dependant child without the additional 4 year commitment.

I saw this in my local newspaper today regarding the Tranferability of the Post 9/11 GI bill. It's looks like those of us near retirement will not have to commit 4 additinal years of service.....

GI BILL TRANSFERABILITY

The Department of Defense has responsibility for implementing the new GI Bill's transferability feature, which lets some service members transfer unused benefits to spouses or children.

The new GI Bill law allows transfer of benefits to a spouse or to children only if service members are on active duty or in the Selected Reserve (drill status) as of Aug. 1, 2009, and agrees to serve an additional four years. The member must have served at least six years already to elect to transfer benefits to a spouse. They must have served 10 years already transfer benefits to children.

Fortunately, the law also gives defense officials broad authority to reshape transferability as needed.

This month, DoD has moved to relax the transfer requirement for service members who are retirement-eligible or nearly so.

The 4-year service requirement would be removed for members eligible to retire now and those who become eligible on or before Aug. 1, 2009, the day the new GI Bill begins.

Those eligible for retirement after Aug. 1, 2009, and before July 1, 2010, would have to serve only one additional year to qualify for GI Bill transferability. Those eligible for retirement after Aug. 1, 2010, and before July 1, 2011, would have to serve two additional years. Those eligible for retirement after Aug. 1, 2011, and before July 1, 2012, would have to serve three additional years to be able to transfer GI Bill benefits to family.

Tom Philpott is a syndicated columnist. Send questions or comments to Military Update, Box 231111, Centreville, Va. 20120-1111; e-mail milup

Dose anyone know if you can extended or reenlisted to get you to ten years of services. I have 20 months left on my contacted. When my contracted is up I will having 9 yrs 10 months in the coast guard.

Unless you need to a short term extension for some other reason (PCS, T/A, resident training, promotion) then no... However... I believe you can now extend for a period of not less than one year at your own request (this is a change from previous years. It used to be two years.)

If you are asking this question on the ESO board, then that tells me that you are probably going to school. I've used education several times in the past to get someone where they needed to be IRT SRB. If it's not illegal, immoral or unsafe...

Anyone know if the new GI Bill will pick up enrollment/grad fees for active duty? It doesn't look like active folks are eligble for the annual book stipend, just wanted to see if the fees mentioned above fall into that category.

This was on military.com on 07MAY:

The rules for Post-9/11 GI Bill transferability are in the final stages, but have not been signed. The following information represents proposed policy, which is subject to change.

Eligible Individuals

Any member of the Armed Forces (active duty or Selected Reserve, officer or enlisted) on or after August 1, 2009, who is eligible for the Post-9/11 GI Bill, and

Has at least 6 years of service in the Armed Forces on the date of election and agrees to serve 4 additional years in the Armed Forces from the date of election.
Has at least 10 years of service in the Armed Forces (active duty and/or selected reserve) on the date of election, is precluded by either standard policy (service or DoD) or statute from committing to 4 additional years, and agrees to serve for the maximum amount of time allowed by such policy or statute, or
Is or becomes retirement eligible during the period from August 1, 2009, through August 1, 2013. A service member is considered to be retirement eligible if he or she has completed 20 years of active duty or 20 qualifying years of reserve service.
For those individuals eligible for retirement on August 1, 2009, no additional service is required.
For those individuals who have an approved retirement date after August 1, 2009, and before July 1, 2010, no additional service is required.
For those individuals eligible for retirement after August 1, 2009, and before August 1, 2010, 1 year of additional service after approval of transfer is required.
For those individuals eligible for retirement on or after August 1, 2010, and before August 1, 2011, 2 years of additional service after approval of transfer are required.
For those individuals eligible for retirement on or after August 1, 2011, and before August 1, 2012, 3 years of additional service after approval of transfer required.

I also have a few questions regarding the new GI Bill. Please don't answer if you are unsure of your answer, you are making an assumption, or you just plain don't know. I am looking for answers to my questions because I am seriously considering transferring my GI Bill to my wife, and I would hate to receive bad information. Thank you.

1. Do the additional four years required include current time left on Active Duty or are they in addition to time left on Active Duty? For Example: I have 3 years left from now, and I am ETS in 2012. Would I only have to sign on for one more year and ETS in 2013 or four more years and ETS in 2016? I believe I would only have to add one additional year to my current contract to qualify for transferring the GI Bill to my wife.

-How soon after transferring the GI Bill to my wife would she be required to start using it?

-Will my wife receive BAH while using the new GI Bill even if I am receiving BAH?

-Will my wife receive BAH even if we are living on a military base?


Thank you for your replies.

quote:

Originally posted by BLUETORCH:
I also have a few questions regarding the new GI Bill. Please don't answer if you are unsure of your answer, you are making an assumption, or you just plain don't know. I am looking for answers to my questions because I am seriously considering transferring my GI Bill to my wife, and I would hate to receive bad information. Thank you.

1. Do the additional four years required include current time left on Active Duty or are they in addition to time left on Active Duty? For Example: I have 3 years left from now, and I am ETS in 2012. Would I only have to sign on for one more year and ETS in 2013 or four more years and ETS in 2016? I believe I would only have to add one additional year to my current contract to qualify for transferring the GI Bill to my wife.

-How soon after transferring the GI Bill to my wife would she be required to start using it?

-Will my wife receive BAH while using the new GI Bill even if I am receiving BAH?

-Will my wife receive BAH even if we are living on a military base?


Thank you for your replies.

The final policy is not signed yet, so all answers are speculation. DOD had a fact sheet on their site, but they took it down yesterday. The info below is based on that information. I can send you a copy of the fact sheet, but I'm sure they took it down for a reason.

1. I have not seen this issue addreesed in the draft policy.

2. 15 years

3. If you are on active duty your wife can not collect BAH.

4. See 3.