FEDweek

10/24/2026

Federal Law Enforcement & Fire: See Your Annuity Estimate
Link to calculator in comments 👇👇👇

Typical immediate “LEO” retirement eligibility:
Age 50 with at least 20 years of covered LEO service, or
Any age with at least 25 years of covered LEO service.

You can also retire under the regular FERS rules (MRA+30, MRA+10 with reduction, age 60 with 20, age 62 with 5), but the special 1.7% LEO formula only applies to qualifying LEO service.

There is also a mandatory separation age (usually 57 with at least 20 years LEO service), though agencies can grant limited waivers.

10/24/2026

Rules End ‘Time in Grade’ Limit on Promotions Applying to Most GS Positions

OPM has finalized rules to end the “time in grade” limit on promotions that has applied in most GS positions.

“This rule removes the requirement that a candidate for advancement to a covered General Schedule position in the competitive service at GS-6 or above have completed 52 weeks in a position no more than one grade lower—or, for positions at GS-6 through GS-11 in lines of work properly classified at two-grade intervals, no more than two grades lower—than the position to be filled,” OPM said in an October 19 Federal Register.

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10/23/2026

OPM Violated Privacy Law in Giving DOGE Access to Federal Employee Personal Info, Judge Rules

The OPM “violated the law and bypassed its established cybersecurity practices” by giving representatives of DOGE “broad access to systems of records containing the personal information of tens of millions of past, current, and aspiring federal employees, even though no credible need for this access had been demonstrated,” a federal judge has ruled.

[link https://www.fedweek.com/federal-managers-daily-report/opm-violated-privacy-law-in-giving-doge-access-to-federal-employee-personal-info-judge-rules/]

District Judge Denise Cote of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York granted final judgment in favor of the AFGE union, individual employees and others who brought the case, although she left for later what type of remedy she will order.

10/23/2026

Tracking Federal Building Occupancy Rates Continues to be a Challenge

Requirements for federal agencies to compile occupancy rates in their buildings should help efforts to shed under-used or unneeded facilities but agencies differ in how they go about it and the data reported to date is incomplete, the GAO has said.

Under the “USE IT Act,” signed in the waning days of the Biden administration, agencies are to collect and report occupancy rates in federally owned and leased space; the law further set occupancy standards which if not met for two consecutive years can trigger a fast-track process for disposing of space. The law was intended as another way to spur such disposals—the difficulty in doing so is one reason management of federal real property has been on GAO’s high-risk list for more than 20 years—and came at a time of much higher rates of offsite work than currently.

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10/23/2026

DoD/DoW secretary Pete Hegseth has issued a memo threatening “administrative, disciplinary, and, where appropriate, criminal action under the Uniform Code of Military Justice and/or applicable federal law” against personnel using using nonpublic information – classified or not – to trade on any financial platform, naming Polymarket and Kalshi as examples.

DoD secretary Pete Hegseth has issued a memo threatening "administrative, disciplinary, and, where appropriate, criminal action under the Uniform Code of

10/22/2026

FMA Raises Concerns about Salary Inversion in Navy

The Federal Managers Association has raised concerns about salary inversion—subordinates being paid more than their managers—at Navy shipyards, saying “This problem is significant, worsening, and increasingly affecting the Navy’s ability to retain and support its management workforce.”

In similar letters to the Navy and DoD/DoW secretary Pete Hegseth, the organization cited pay increases and differentials for wage grade employees in recent years exceeding GS raises at the Norfolk, Va., shipyard and at least three others. While the FMA supports those raises, “This pay structure has raised serious concerns among a growing number of our Navy GS members who supervise non-GS employees now earning higher compensation,” it wrote.

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10/22/2026

FLRA Says Sloppy Legal Work by HHS Smells of AI, Sides with Union in Key Telework Case

In a key decision in one of the many disputes over the widespread cancellation of telework, the FLRA has found that HHS violated a contract with the NTEU union, meanwhile criticizing the department for presenting “fictitious, erroneous, or irrelevant” legal arguments that seemed to be AI-generated.

The case is one of several in which arbitrators have ruled that the administration’s return-to-office policy, set by an early 2025 presidential memo, does not override telework-related provisions in negotiated contracts, which for example set standards for when it may be canceled.

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10/22/2026

Workforce Cuts, Improper Payments in Health and Retirement Benefits Top Management Challenges for OPM

Following are portions of an inspector general report listing top management challenges facing OPM that discuss the impact of the workforce cuts there since the start of 2025 as well as long-running challenges including improper enrollments in the FEHB/PSHB health insurance program as well as improper payments in that program and in retirement benefits.

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10/22/2026

How Does My FEHB/PSHB Plan Stack Up? How to Assess

If you’re a federal employee, there’s a good chance you’ve had the same FEHB plan for years. Maybe even decades. And that’s not uncommon—most people don’t like dealing with health insurance, and once they’ve picked a plan that “works,” they tend to stick with it. But here’s the reality: the Federal Employees Health Benefits (FEHB) Program changes every single year—and the difference between your current plan and a better option could literally be thousands of dollars.

OPM reports that for 2027 the overall average FEHB premium will rise 9.3 percent, while the average enrollee share will rise 10.9 percent. That follows increases of 10.2 percent and 12.3 percent for 2026. For PSHB, the overall average premium increase is 6.7 percent, with an enrollee share of 8.2% more.

[link in comments 👇]

So, how do you know if your FEHB/PSHB plan still stacks up against others? Let’s break it down – applicable in both cases.

10/21/2026

OSC Presents Award to FAA Surgeon for Flagging Lapses in Medical Reviews of Pilots

The Office of Special Counsel has presented its Outstanding Public Servant award to Dr. Brett Wyrick, Deputy Federal Air Surgeon at the FAA for disclosing delays in medical reviews of airline transport pilots, commercial pilots, and private pilots.

The OSC earlier had announced that an investigation based on those disclosures had confirmed the issues and spurred the agency to increase staffing and put in place measures to improve the medical certification and clearance processes, although at the time the individual’s name was not disclosed.

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