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USCG Pay & Personnel Center             

Direct Access User Guides Retiree Self-Service E-Gov Travel System (ETS)

Travel (TVL) Branch

Systems Availability

UPDATE: DEERS / ID CARD RESTORED

To our Coast Guard, PHS and NOAA retirees and their families,

The Coast Guard and the Defense Manpower Data Center (DMDC) has restored all affected members’ DEERS/TRICARE eligibility.  Approximately 16,500 members’ eligibility was temporarily dropped when a planned file transfer between the Coast Guard and DMDC ran into technical difficulties.  Coast Guard and DMDC leadership and technical teams worked expeditiously to restore the accounts to the proper status enabling regular TRICARE coverage.  Additionally, our combined teams are reviewing the file transfer process to make sure this type of issue does not happen again.  We regret the inconvenience and uncertainty this outage caused and appreciate you checking PPC’s website for the latest information and sharing it with our Coast Guard family.

PPC sent notifications to all retired members using their Direct Access email on file.  If you did not receive this notification, please take a moment to update your Direct Access contact information.  In addition to helping us pass information for emergencies such as this, it will greatly assist everybody for future messaging . . . especially with tax season right around the corner.  Additionally, the Coast Guard National Retiree Council (CGNRC) is another great resource for information across our retiree community.  Their Help Desk can be reached at 757-523-6940.  PPC thanks the CGNRC for helping pass information during this unfortunate DEERS eligibility event.

If you wish to verify your DEERS eligibility status, please visit the milConnect website:  milConnect (osd.mil).  If you have any questions or concerns, your primary point of contact is DMDC’s Beneficiary Line at 1-800-538-9552.  They are staffed to receive your calls and help resolve these types of situations.

DIRECT ACCESS CHALLENGES

Our Pay and Personnel Center team members are users of Direct Access –just like you– and are similarly impacted by challenges with the system.  Though the Pay and Personnel Center does not own or control repairs to Direct Access, we continue to advocate with the Program Office to prioritize repairs and the C5I Service Center to conduct those repairs.  We appreciate your patience and grace during this time period.

In essence, Direct Access is our ship . . . and our ship is damaged and undergoing depot-level repairs.  The crew at the Pay and Personnel Center are just as eager for Direct Access to come back to fully mission capable, so we can better serve our Coast Guard families.

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.

ETS Quick Reference Cards

About Quick Reference Cards 

The quick reference cards listed below are provided by CWT Sato Travel (ETS Contractor). Some are generic guides and have not been customized for the U. S. Coast Guard. There are two categories of cards:

  1. Cards for the individual traveler or the travel arranger 
  2. Cards and for the approver-the approving official 
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 Quick Reference Cards (QRC) for Travelers and Travel Arrangers

 

 Quick Reference Cards (QRC) for Approvers

  • MOBILE APPROVALS QUICK REFERENCE CARD February 2022

    Approvers review travel documents – authorizations, vouchers, advances, and local travel claims – to ensure 1. The document is within travel policy 2. Correct accounts have been selected to fund the travel expenses 3. Expenses are correctly estimated or claimed and reimbursement types are correct

  • APPROVING DOCUMENTS QUICK REFERENCE CARD February 2022

    Approvers review travel documents, ensuring that: 1. The document is within the travel policy. 2. The correct accounts have been selected to fund the travel expenses. You can make funding changes if needed. 3. For authorizations, approvers also verify that the expenses are correctly estimated, reimbursement types are correct, estimated expenses have been properly split between funds, and reservations are within policy. 4. For group and open authorizations, approvers also verify that the specific limitations are correct.

  • APPROVING ADVANCES QUICK REFERENCE CARD February 2022

    Approvers review travel advance requests, ensuring that: 1. The advance is within the travel policy. 2. The correct accounts have been selected to fund the advance. You can make funding changes if needed.

 

ETS User Guides

About the User Guides

The user guides listed below are provided by CWT Sato Travel (ETS Contractor). Some are generic guides and have not been customized for the U. S. Coast Guard. There are two categories of user guides:

  1. Guides for the individual traveler or the travel arranger.
  2. Guides for the approver-the approving official.
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 User Guides for Travelers and Travel Arrangers

  • PCS Advances & PCS Claims

    Until a new system is in place for PCS claims, we're using a combination of TPAX and ETS to calculate, approve, and payout PCS advances and claims.

  • APPLICATION OVERVIEW

    An overview of the ETS application. Updated January 2022.

  • FIRST LOG ON AND PROFILE UPDATES

    Before you can log on and use ETS to manage your travel needs, you need a user ID and access credentials. A travel policy manager or other authority in your office or workgroup will provide you with this information When your account is available, you will receive an email message notifying you that your account has been created. The email provides you with a link you must follow to complete your security profile and gain access to ETS. 

    Update Travel Charge Card for Future-Dated Reservations: When you update the credit card number or expiration date for a travel charge card (GTCC) on the Credit Cards page of a traveler’s E2 user profile, E2 will now check for reservations (i.e., held reservations or a reservation attached to a trip) using that GTCC that have at least one future-dated segment. If a corresponding reservation is found, E2 will update the reservation with the new TCC information. An entry will also be added to the Trip History for any affected trip to reference the change. Updated November 2021.

  • GETTING STARTED

    Getting started with ETS. This guide lists the various browser, booking site, and desktop requirements needed to run ETS. Updated January 2022.

  • MAKING RESERVATIONS

    How to make travel reservations in ETS.

  • CREATING AUTHORIZATIONS

    How to create a travel authorization in ETS. Updated November 2021

  • AMENDING AUTHORIZATIONS

    How to amend a travel authorization in ETS.  Updated November 2021.

  • CREATING VOUCHERS

    How to create a travel voucher in ETS.  Updated January 2022.

  • CREATING LOCAL TRAVEL CLAIMS

    How to create a local travel claim in ETS. Updated January 2002.

  • CREATING OPEN AUTHORIZATIONS

    How to create an open (blanket) travel authorization in ETS. Updated November 2021.

  • CREATING ADVANCES

    How to create requests for advances in ETS. Updated January 2022.

  • CREATING GROUP AUTHORIZATIONS

    How to create a group travel authorization in ETS

  • CROSSING FISCAL YEARS

    ALCGFINANCE 035/22 provides guidance for temporary duty travel crossing fiscal years (FY). Specifically, it applies to cases where advanced preparation in FY22 is required to effectively facilitate FY23 travel. FY22 is 30 September 2022 and prior. FY23 is 01 October 2022 through 30 September 2023. PPC (P&D) has also prepared a user guide for the process - Processing Cross Fiscal Year Travelpdf.

  • TAKING OTHER TRIP ACTIONS

    Most of your actions in E2 Solutions involve a specific document, like an authorization, voucher, or local travel claim. Some actions, however, impact multiple documents. Canceling a trip, for example, impacts all documents associated with the trip, including authorizations, vouchers, travel advances, and reservations. Trip actions include • Canceling a trip • Closing a trip • Copying a trip • Working with trip templates • Making reservations after authorization approval. Updated January 2022.

 

 User Guides for Approvers

 

ETS Walkthroughs

These guides are annotated screenshots that walk users through various tasks in ETS.

(*)  YN2 Steinbach, Airstation San Francisco, created and provided these guides.
(**) YN1 Heather Everett, TRACEN Petaluma, created and provided this guide.

(***) YNC Catherine Schmidt

To ensure a positive experience for everyone, we kindly ask that all interactions with our technicians be conducted respectfully.

Please note our Ticket System does not reply with an assigned number.

 

CUSTOMER CARE INQUIRIES

PPC Call Center Technicians are prohibited from performing most inquiries. 

All Active Duty and Reserve members requesting PPC assistance must submit a PPC Customer Care Ticket. Please see FAQ page for more details: CCB FAQ

Customers are directed to contact their P&A Office for any errors or questions on pay and/or personnel issues.  If the P&A Office is unable to resolve it, the P&A Office is to contact the servicing SPO.  If the servicing SPO is unable to resolve the issues, the SPO will contact PPC. 

TRAVEL INQUIRIES 

PPC Customer Care Call Technicians do not have the ability to unlock any users accounts.

Any member with travel related inquiries will need to be contact your local travel AO. If your AO is unable to resolve the inquiry, your travel AO must submit a PPC Customer Care Ticket for assistance. Please see FAQ page for more details: CCB FAQ

RETIREE/ANNUITANT INQUIRIES

PPC Call Center Technicians are prohibited from performing most inquiries.

We assist customers through getting issues identified and elevated by creating trouble-tickets for review and action that to go to the Retired Annuitant Services (RAS) branch.  You may also submit an email that feeds into the trouble ticket system via PPC-DG-CustomerCare@uscg.mil.  Please ensure your request contains a front and back copy of members photo ID and all required forms located at:  Pay and Personnel Center (PPC), Retiree and Annuitant Services (uscg.mil).  Direct Access Self Service remains the most secure and efficient means of managing your account.

The Pay and Personnel Center (PPC) is committed to protecting customer information. The PPC Call Center has experienced numerous attempts by bad actors to access retiree information. The following are a couple of instances:

  • Over three months, a suspicious caller (male in his 20s) attempted to access a retired Coast Guard Commander’s account by calling PPC and through email inquiries. At the time, there was no power of attorney on file. PPC challenged the individual claiming to be the retiree because of the email address not matching what was on file.
  • PPC received an email impersonating a retired National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Lieutenant Commander. The email stated that the retiree’s identification card was stolen. The email address did not match what was on file. After a brief fact-finding effort, the retiree was in Texas and did not send an email. The email originated from Bakersfield, CA.

The examples above and numerous others drove PPC’s Call Center to change procedures to mitigate fraud attempts by bad actors. PPC strongly encourages retirees to make all changes to their accounts via self-service. However, we understand there are instances where retirees cannot update their information via self-service. Strict protocols are in place to protect the retiree’s information when self-service is not an option for updating account information.

  • First, the Call Center will not change account information over the phone.
  • All retiree requests for account changes must be submitted via a customer care ticket by the retiree and include the proper form for the transaction and a photocopy of a valid government photo identification card (front and back).
  • While PPC makes every effort to protect accounts from fraud, it does occur. When PPC identifies potentially fraudulent activities, the Call Center contacts the Retiree and Annuitants Services (RAS) Branch.
  • RAS will contact the retiree and verify if the retiree contacted PPC to request an update to their account information. When a retiree confirms they did not make a request, PPC places a lock on the Direct Access account, and only PPC can make changes.
  • Finally, PPC adds the retiree to a “be on the lookout” list shared by the Call Center and RAS to coordinate response efforts to respond to and prevent fraudulent activity.

NEW: Retiree FastPass Now Available!

To avoid a wait time, Retirees/Annuitants can now submit a PPC Retiree FastPass ticket.