Photo By Janecze Wright | A Soldier submits paperwork June 1, 2023, at the Education Center. Soldiers must bring...... read more read more
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KILLEEN, Texas -- Soldiers have until June 30 to submit Historical Tuition Assistance Requests.
The Army Credentialing and Continuing Education Services for Soldiers Headquarters created the requests to clear out the backlog from the transition from Go Army Ed to Army Ignited Portal.
An exception to policy was initiated at the beginning of the year for Soldiers, who were unable to request TA or had a TA request that was only partially funded through ArmyIgnitED 1.0, to come to the education center so they can attempt to get the request fully paid.
After almost six months, the deadline for the education center to submit HTARs for Soldiers who did not have a TA request created for fiscal year 2021/22 courses will end at 11:59 p.m. EST June 30, meaning Soldiers have just a few weeks to submit requests.
“If Soldiers do not meet that deadline, if they have TARs out there, if their school is billing them for a course that the Army could and should be paying for and they miss the deadline, they will have to pay out of pocket,” Sheri Buono, education services officer, said. “There will be no other option to seek that funding through the Army.”
Buono explained that specific documentation is needed to submit an HTAR and Soldiers must reach out to the education center for assistance with all required documents no later than 3:30 p.m. June 30.
She noted that Soldiers must come into the Education Center prior to close of business that day to ensure requests are submitted on time.
“You need to be through the door with your documentation by 1530 on the 30th of June,” Buono said. “So, as long as they walk through the door with it, I have time to submit it up the chain before my close of business.”
The documentation from the school must include course code and title, course cost verification, course final grade, course start and end dates, Soldier name and the academic institution’s name.
If the invoice just provides a lump sum, Soldiers must submit additional documentation that breaks down the costs for each course.
She stressed that an HTAR request cannot be submitted if there is any incomplete or missing documentation and urged Soldiers to speak to an education counselor as early as possible.
Once the HTAR has been created, the Soldier must sign the TA invoice and provide a signed copy to their school. The school can then invoice the Army for payment.
Buono estimates that the center has processed hundreds of requests since the beginning of the year with the assistance of partnering campuses and many Soldiers have been contacted directly.
“We’ve processed over 600 HTARs at this point since the beginning of the year,” she said. “We have been working with our on base MOU (Memorandum of Understanding) schools and some of the bigger off base schools. They’ve provided us Soldiers who may need an HTAR.”
“So, we’ve kind of crunched through that list and reached out to Soldiers to say, ‘Hey, you might need an HTAR because you don’t have one existing,’” she contiued. “And so, a lot of those Soldiers we’ve captured that way.”
Buono added that even if a Soldier has already paid out of pocket for courses, they can still submit an HTAR and get that money reimbursed if their school is willing to invoice the Army.
She said the goal is to save the Soldier from having to pay any money out of pocket.
“We either want to put money back in the Soldier’s pocket if they’ve paid out of pocket, or we want to prevent money from coming out of their pocket by creating that HTAR so that the Army will pay their bill,” Buono said.
Buono said that even though this has been ongoing since January, there are many more Soldiers who are unaware that they can still get reimbursed for classes.
“So, I know there’s more Soldiers out there. I know there are, there have to be,” she said. “We just want to capture as many as we can before that deadline so that they’re not having to pay out of pocket.”
| Date Taken: | 06.08.2023 |
| Date Posted: | 09.01.2023 11:33 |
| Story ID: | 447846 |
| Location: | FORT CAVAZOS, TEXAS, US |
| Web Views: | 77 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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