Any National Call to Service Reservists?

[Bonnie P]

Hi, my son is a NCS Reservist who completed his 15 months of active duty and is half way through his two years of active reserves. Horrible contract and one that was not clearly explained to my son. Of course, when he signed it none of the Sailors who had already signed this contract had completed their 15 months and therefore it was not know how difficult and basically impossible it was to remain active. Even though the contract stated they had the 'option' to stay active. I would love to meet anyone whose Sailor also is NCS.

[Bonnie P]

Scotty,

I can understand you wanting him to get a taste of active duty but it would have been frustrating if he decided then that he wanted to stay active and they wouldn't let him. My son finds it difficult to enjoy his drill weekends because he rarely gets to do his job and he knows what it really is like. Best of luck to your son. I think they stopped the NCS program.

[Tonya Hall-Serna]

Hi, Bonnie.
My son is a NCS Reservist. This is the WORST contract! He has had one difficulty after another with it. We've lost count how many times he had to show his contract to personnel because of errors. Before the end of his 15 months AC, he requested extension of AC - denied. I haven't heard of anyone given the extension. In fact, if you read the Milpersman 1133-080 (which was updated last year due to confusions), it states that the purpose of this contract was to increase Reservists. I'm a member of 2 other Navy websites and there are several upset parents/sailors about this contract. My son has 1 more year in SELRES with remaining MSO in IRR. This past weekend when he reported for muster, he was informed that he was given a discharge - missed time due to his job sending him out of state. When he informed the personnel at Base about employer wanting to send him out of state (he was never given a Contact!), he was given approval. He was even informed on how to "make up" the days! Now it appears that the person never passed the information on. The confusing part is that he was part of a retirement ceremony in March and was informed in March that he was going to New York for his 2 week drill. He has filed a dispute/waiver...whatever it's called. Fortunately, he still has the emails that he sent.
He was never given a warning, never counseled on possible Discharge...He's pretty darn mad. He doesn't want out. He now has a new employer and will not require working out of town. We'll see if he has any luck....but based on what I've researched, it's not common for the discharge to be "reversed".
Hope your Sailor has much better luck with the NCS!!

[Bonnie P]

Hi Tonya, Luckily my son has been able to change his reserve duty days when he has training at his job. He has not missed any of his weekends but only did one week last summer. Not sure if he has to make that up or not. His biggest beef in the beginning of his reserve duty was that he was not assigned to his drill unit for around six months even though they had a active MA unit. He still has no idea why it took so long. He would like to go active again but am not sure if he is talking to anyone about it yet. He tends to procrastinate. He does really enjoy is drill unit but not the whole weekend Sailor thing. Hope your son gets his discharge 'reversed', that is unbelievable.

Rene, glad your daughter understood the whole NCS Reserve thing. It would be so ironic if she is kept active longer when that is not what she wanted.

[Rene]

My daughter is NCS not yet completed her 15 months of active duty and she has had no problems so far we will see when her ship deploys in summer if they will have her home in time for her dec 3rd release date I hope they dont keep her longer.She did it for the help with school funding the biggest reason. i must admit i dont know that much about the actual contract she signed is there a site with details? i know she will have to do 4 yrs reserves but she explained it like it was no problem.And it may not be i just dont know that much about it.

[Tonya Hall-Serna]

Rene:
I found an "explanation" of the NCS on the official Navy Reserve website. There's a link for the NCS. I'm also a member of another Navy parent website that has a forum just on the NCS. They have a downloaded copy of the NCS program. As I said, I haven't heard of a single parent or Sailor that has been happy with the NCS.
My son thought NCS wasn't a problem either - at first. He honestly believes that because he was AC for only 15 months and would leave for RR, he wasn't given the same treatment as regular AC Sailors. Based on research I did, the "higher ups" didn't like the contract either - spend all this time and manpower training someone so that they leave in 15 months? Complaints were actually made to Legislature...
Bonnie:
How was your son able to change his drill days? In my son's case, he was given a contact name and email address (in October! he was transferred to RR in May!) to send his "excused absences" to. Now it appears that the contact never forwarded the chits and may have even been transferred. Communication at this base is pretty bad. My son enjoyed drill duty too but hated it that 90% of the time, they sat in a classroom. He wanted to DO THINGS. :)

[Bonnie P]

Tonya, The first time he needed to change he brought the paperwork from his job stating the date of the training. He may have had to bring paperwork for the other training that he just did as well but I am not sure. Usually he goes in during the week if he can't make it that weekend and it is usually the days just before or just after his regular drill weekend. I don't think he has actually missed any 'time'. He is at a base that does mostly security and his drill unit is all MAs. Occasionally he does other jobs rather than security but rarely sits in a classroom. He also has never complained about being treated differently than other MAs, so maybe he was lucky.

[Angie F.- WA: HM mom]

Hi ladies, so I heard there has been a problem recently with our NCS Reservists NOT receiving their promised Bonuses (especially as part of their re-enlistment contract) and hitting a dead end in the path to "C" schools and further Active Duty if they so wish. So, I went straight to one of our onsite Recruiter resources to see if I could get some clarification. Here was his reply:

"The NCS (National Call to Serve) contract is still counted as a Reserve contract, but what happens is the Sailor spends 15-18 months on Active Duty, just like any other Active Duty Sailor, then he will transfer to the Navy Reserves. I have not seen anyone classified into a NCS contract in a long time. I am not sure if they have phased it out yet or not but I think it is going away.

The NAT (New Accessions Training) is also a Reserve Contract, but with that contract the Sailor simply goes to Bootcamp then to "A" school and then they will check into the Reserve Center that is on their contract that they signed at MEPs. They then start doing their one weekend a month and their annual training every year. I tried to make some phone calls about the bonuses, but I couldn't really get a straight answer on that for you. If I can find anything out I will be sure to let you know."

I will keep digging to see if we can get to the bottom of this issue. Sounds like a huge "breach of contract" by the Navy/Government, but I guess they can pretty much do as they need/please and our Sailors get the raw deal in the process. Let us know if any of you get the scoop elsewhere.

[Tonya Hall-Serna]

If I remember correctly, the NCS was to have ended on 12-31-07. It was a temporary contract used to increase the number of sailors in reserves. My son had absolutely no difficulties receiving his bonus. That was pretty much the ONLY thing that wasn't messed up! :)

[Bonnie P]

Angie... Thanks for checking in to this more. I am always interested in learning more info. I recently reconnected with an old high school friend and it ends up her son is also in the Navy and is going to become a recruiter. She has asked him to look in to this for me as well.

As for my son he really hasn't had it bad, except for the fact that he wanted to stay active but since he heard that no one was basically being allowed to, he didn't even put in a request. He enjoyed his active duty, likes his drill unit but would still prefer active duty. He had reached PO3 while still active but then reached PO2 after joining his reserve unit. The only problem he had with them was they delayed connecting him to his drill until for seven months, so he did his drill weekends doing odd jobs.

He had his drill weekend last weekend, they are having him come back next weekend and then two weeks later he has a drill week.

The only thing I am concerned about at this time is his chance of re-enlisting to active duty after the end of his active reserve duty. Will let you know what I find out.

[Bonnie P]

Well a lot happened during my son's drill week this week. He called to inform us that he received orders and is being mobilized. He leaves for training the end of summer and then goes to Bahrain for a year or more. This wasn't a IA volunteer situation and he has not told us if he knows why he was chosen. It appears he was the only one out of his drill unit to be mobilized. Hope this helps him re-enlist to active duty and will keep you all informed.

[Sandra L.]

My son has had similar problems. He wants and is trying to go active and it is so hard. I can't even begin to tell you what he has been through.

[witnee]

I am on National Call to Service contract.. 15 mos. active after bootcamp / a school / c school.. IF you can get a c school, they wouldnt send me to one because of this contract.. then 24 months active reserves OR you can request to stay active for 24 months. I just found out in order to apply to stay active duty you have to submit the paper work 10 MONTHS prior to your EAOS date (the date your original 15 months active duty ends, if the rate is overmanned it probably won't get approved because the navy is downsizing) ALSO you have to submit a PTS (perform to serve) between 15-and 12 months prior (they should ask their career counseler about this as soon as they report to their first duty station after training). I also found out that you can't be stationed over seas on this contract (at least for the first 15 months-not 100% sure about this because I didn't want to be overseas).

Anyways, I am GMSN Louvat and I went to bootcamp july 28 2008. I went to A school and now I'm in Jacksonville FL.. I have to decide if I want to try and continue on active duty BY August 27 (paper work and everything). I am willing to bet a lot of the peoples request to stay active duty got denied because they didn't know it had to be done 10 months before their EAOS, but I don't have proof of that - but there was no one to tell me what to do - you need to ask A LOT of questions to A LOT of people to get what you need. Its hard to find someone who knows exactly what you need with this contract. Anyways, I just wanted to tell you this so you're son/daughter will have an easier time figuring all of this out than I did.