Sailors who geographically separate from their family as part of a permanent change of station can now receive basic housing allowance based on their family’s location.
A new Navy policy will allow sailors to choose to receive BAH for their family’s location instead for their new location, according to NAVADMIN 192/24 released Tuesday. The policy will go into effect on Oct. 1.
“NAVADMIN 192/24 allows Sailors to receive BAH based on their dependents’ location within the Continental United Staes, Alaska and Hawaii if the dependents remain at the previous duty station,” reads a fact sheet associated with the NAVADMIN’s release.
The dependents may also be at another previously authorized location, according to the NAVADMIN.
The change was made in order to give sailors more options when they PCS, said LT Meagan Morrison, spokesperson with the Office of the Chief of Naval Personnel.
“If family stability, leaving family at old [duty station] for school or jobs, is more important than moving together, this allows them some flexibility in that,” Morrison said in an email.
Sailors may only receive BAH for one location, according to the NAVADMIN. So if they receive it for their family’s location, they cannot receive it for their new duty station.
Those who do choose to receive BAH for their family’s location will not necessarily be granted space in the Navy’s unaccompanied housing. It will be granted by availability, reads the NAVADMIN.
The change in BAH comes as the Navy, as well as other service branches, look at options to make it easier to have a family while serving. The Navy and the Marines have also looked at how they can be more flexible in allowing people to stay longer in locations so they do not have to interrupt schooling or make a spouse leave a job.
Three out of 10 sailors did not have to move based on their billet assignments, Chief of Naval Personnel Adm. Richard Cheeseman said at a Navy Memorial talk in May. That was due to the detailing marketplace assignment policy that allows sailors to have more control over their next billets, including geographic location.
