The Army is behind paying some $8.5 million worth of bonuses it promised to noncommissioned officers who went to recruiting school last winter as part of a surge to reverse a historic slump in enlistments.
In November, the service made a chaotic mad dash to deal with the recruiting crisis, begging for volunteers and ordering about 800 soldiers to the recruiting school at Fort Knox, Kentucky — with some troops getting only a week’s notice. Meanwhile, service planners promised $5,000 enlistment bonuses to anyone who attended the school between Nov. 1 and March 31.
Out of the 1,700 soldiers who attended the school in that time period, only two have received the bonus, the Army confirmed to Military.com.
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“The Army announced it would pay a $5,000 incentive to soldiers interested in becoming recruiters over the winter,” Master Sgt. Josephine Pride, an Army spokesperson, said in a statement to Military.com. “Two soldiers have met those requirements.”
However, Pride declined to comment on what is causing the delay — whether there is a delay in processing the payments, soldiers haven’t been properly briefed on how to get their payments, or those new recruiters aren’t being assigned to recruiting duty — despite the calls from service planners that gaps needed to be filled quickly.
For recruiters to qualify, they must have graduated from the…
