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USCG Pay & Personnel Center             

DIRECT ACCESS 

The Pay and Personnel Center (PPC) Customer Care Branch is receiving a high volume of phone calls and email inquiries from customers indicating Direct Access is down, timing out, or not accessible. If you or your members are experiencing any of the below error codes, please submit your concerns to C5ISC via CGFIXIT Ticket with a screenshot of the error code along with the IP Address you are attempting to log into DA from. PPC is unable to resolve Direct Access connectivity and system issues.

Errors identified:

  • Spinning circle
  • DA Link is timing out
  • 404 Error code
  • Authorization Error – Contact your Security Administrator
  • Hmmm… Can’t reach this page

PASSWORD RESET

The password reset function in Direct Access doesn’t function as designed. The loss of functionality is a result of Direct Access’s migration to a cloud provider’s servers.  We apologize for the inconvenience. Unfortunately, the Pay and Personnel Center (PPC) does not have oversight of Direct Access functionality. PPC has made the C5I Service Center aware of the degradation in password reset functionality.  The C5I Service Center is working diligently to correct this issue. Please submit a trouble ticket for a password reset to ppc-dg-customercare@uscg.mil

If your email address is NOT present or is incorrect, you will not be able to use the self-service password reset feature. Your business email address in DIRECT ACCESS must be added to the system or corrected.  Active duty and Reserve members must contact your P&A office or Servicing Pay Office (SPO) for assistance to update. 

Please note: Customer Care will no longer send password resets for active/reserve military members or civilian employees to personal email addresses. All password resets will be sent to USCG.MIL email addresses only. Do not submit multiple requests.  Please allow 5 days upon submission for response. 

Guide: Passwords and Set up/Update Security Questions

RETIRED PAY

At present, for temporary, permanent, VA offset, AEW’s, CRDP, and CRSC disability, we are encountering a processing delay due to systematic issues and a shortage of personnel. You remain our primary concern. We want to assure you that we are fully committed to resolving these issues promptly and handling your cases with utmost proficiency.

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Mailing Address:

Commanding Officer (Staff Symbol)
U.S. Coast Guard 
Pay & Personnel Center
444 S. E. Quincy St.
Topeka, KS 66683-3591

Telephone

(866) 772-8724
0730-1600 (Central time) M-F

E-Mail

PPC-DG-CustomerCare@uscg.mil

Web Content Manager 

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Reminder: If your retirement date is on or after 1 January, 2022, as of 1 November 2021, PPC/RAS will no longer accept Form CG-4700 as your application for retirement pay

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Reminder: If your retirement date is on or after 1 January, 2022, as of 1 November 2021, PPC/RAS will no longer accept Form CG-4700 as your application for retirement pay. Instead, please submit DD-2656 at least 90 days prior to your date of retirement.

We are pleased to announce that the PPC is changing from using the CG-4700 Form, Coast Guard, PHS, & NOAA Retired Pay Account Worksheet and Survivor Benefit Plan Election, to using the  DD Form 2656, Data for Payment of Retired Personnel.  This move from the CG-4700 to the DD Form 2656 will allow for more information to be immediately available to members (e.g., Survivor Benefit Plan (SBP) and Blended Retirement System (BRS)) and for consistency of retired pay information across all the services.

Additionally, the DD Form 2656 is much more interactively friendly than our current form and it provides informational material (e.g., BRS Lump Sum information) that will help our members make informed decisions for future retirement planning.     

This transition has just begun to occur and during the transition both forms are perfectly acceptable for use.  PPC's Retiree and Annuitant Services (RAS) Branch has begun providing the DD Form 2656 to members who will be retiring in July 2021 but, again, either form is acceptable for use during the transition period.  Members who have already submitted a CG-4700 form do not need to complete a new form.  We hope to have the transition complete by January 1, 2022 and begin using only the DD Form 2656 for members who submit a retirement form after that date.

The Form DD 2656 is available at the following link:

https://www.esd.whs.mil/Portals/54/Documents/DD/forms/dd/dd2656.PDF

Many people will try opening a PDF form and find that they get an error that says "Please wait."  This is not a problem with the form but has to do with the set-up of your computer's browser as the default for opening Adobe Acrobat forms.  Many computers use the browser's built-in PDF viewer as the default for opening Adobe forms, but the browser's viewer cannot handle the macros built into the form. The simple solution to this problem is to save the form to your computer and then open the form by starting Acrobat Reader DC (from the start menu) and use it to open the form from its saved location.  This should open the form in Adobe Acrobat Reader DC rather than your browser, allowing full functionality.

Note: We used the Microsoft Edge browser for this guide.

  1. Click on a form link.
    Click on a form link
  2.  A message “The document you are trying to load…” appears instead of the form.
    Error Message
  3. Click on the Save icon.
    Save the form
  4. The file save dialog box will open.
    The standard file dialog box on Windows 10
  5. Select a folder, rename the file (if desired), and save it.
    Saving a file
  6. Navigate to the folder where you saved the file.
    Locate a file on the desktop
  7. Right-mouse click on the file icon or name and select Open with > Adobe Acrobat Reader DC.
    Opening a file with a program
  8. Acknowledge any notices that appear.
    Text prompt - Read the instructions at the end of the file.
  9. Fill in the form, saving it periodically. Save and print when completed.
    Saving and printing a PDF form

 

The DD-2656 and other necessary forms are listed in the Retirement PackagePDF and can be accessed online. Please complete the forms and worksheets legibly. We strongly recommend you fill them out online using the Adobe Acrobat program on the Coast Guard, PHS, or NOAA Standard Workstation. Completion of the Data for Payment of Retired Personnel Form (DD-2656)PDF is mandatory to establish your account so you can be paid on time. The completed DD-2656pdf must be scanned and attached to a PPC Help Ticket to PPC (RAS) at least 90 days prior to your date of retirement.

PPC (RAS) is now accepting:

Forms can be found at: www.dcms.uscg.mil/ppc/pd/forms.

Coast Guard, PHS, and NOAA personnel with questions on completing the DD-2656 should contact PPC (RAS) via email to PPC-DG-CustomerCare@uscg.milCoast Guard, PHS, and NOAA personnel must not contact the Defense Finance Account Service (DFAS)  for assistance or submit completed DD-2656 forms to DFAS. PPC (RAS) establishes and maintains retired pay accounts for Coast Guard, PHS, and NOAA personnel; DFAS provides retired pay support to members of DoD components. 



The U.S. Department of Defense is committed to making its electronic and information technologies accessible to individuals with disabilities in accordance with Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act (29 U.S.C. 794d), as amended in 1998. DoD websites use the WCAG 2.0 AA accessibility standard.

For persons with disabilities experiencing difficulties accessing content on a particular website, please use the form DoD Section 508 Form.  In this form, please indicate the nature of your accessibility issue/problem and your contact information so we can address your issue or question. If your issue involves log in access, password recovery, or other technical issues, contact the administrator for the website in question, or your local helpdesk.