Finance changing to meet future demands

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Francesca Popp
  • 3rd Wing Public Affairs
ELMENDORF AIR FORCE BASE, Alaska --  The 3rd Comptroller Squadron is beginning to change the way it does business, while still meeting customer demands. 

The changes within the squadron will align with the Air Force's personnel drawdown over the next five years. 

"No matter how you look at it, we will all be affected by these changes in some way, shape or form," said Master Sgt. Scott Armstrong, 3rd CPTS financial management office chief, noting the entire finance career field is being affected by the cuts. "As a result, the finance community has been forced to rethink the way we operate." 

The Secretary of the Air Force for Financial Management and his team have developed the career field's future scope of operations to ensure continued support to Airmen and DoD civilians. The plan involves several phased steps that allow the transformation to ultimately comply with Air Force Smart Operations of the 21st Century. 

The first phase is using the Air Force Financial Services Center - a central processing and call center - based at Ellsworth Air Force Base, S.D. The call center will handle all military pay and travel inquiries via a toll-free 800 number and can be accessed 24/7. 

Sergeant Armstrong said the call center is similar to how an insurance company used by many military members provides its customer services. 

"In fact, the Air Force is using USAA as their benchmark for automated and telephone services. This is the way corporate America has been successfully operating for years and there is no reason to believe the Air Force can't do the same," the sergeant said, admitting the center won't be fully operational until October 2008. 

The second phase is transforming the way base-level finance offices handle current processes. 

Sergeant Armstrong said manning changes are already happening within the squadron, even though the workload has not yet been transferred to the AFFSC. The financial service the Air Force currently provides isn't being eliminated; however, it is being updated with advances in technology and the Internet. 

"The footprint in our office will become much smaller, reducing from 22 people to eight," he said. 

Those people will still handle all military and travel pay processes, but request their customers use the alternative finance tools to make it happen. The tools are self-service Web sites, such as myPay and the Defense Travel System. 

"The myPay site allows members to handle many of their military pay needs," said 1st Lt. Douglas Bauer, 3rd CPTS financial management officer. "The best part is the member can do it at their convenience." 

The site - https://mypay.dfas.mil - allows members to handle common pay items such as viewing mid- and end-of-month pay amounts, allotments, Thrift Savings Plan, leave balances and more. 

In addition to myPay, members can process their own travel orders and vouchers via DTS. Lieutenant Bauer said the system currently only manages routine temporary duty-type trips, but will have the capability to process all deployment and formal training orders in the future. 

"Both of these systems pull customers out of the finance lobby and empower them to take care of their finance needs when it's convenient for them," said the lieutenant. 

Furthermore, Sergeant Armstrong said that while many people like face-to-face interaction, manning cuts do not allow for this. 

"With manning cuts hitting the finance organization there simply aren't enough faces left to provide this service, especially those services that can be handled by myPay, DTS or the per diem sites," he said, adding that people in the finance customer service area will no longer assist someone either in person or over the phone since these services are available online. 

Sergeant Armstrong and Lieutenant Bauer did emphasize that finance representatives will still be available to assist with the more complex pay issues, but on a much smaller contingent, until all the changes take effect.