The Army is once again grappling with technical problems and is seemingly unable to reliably pay out education benefits to soldiers, just as deadlines for fall semester enrollments have passed at many universities.
For at least a month, soldiers have been reporting issues accessing their benefits though Army IgnitED, an online portal that handles tuition payments and for years has been marred by technical issues. And the Army has no timeline on when a fix will be coming, according to a statement online from the service.
“We are tracking this issue,” a statement on the Army IgnitED Facebook page said. “We don’t have an ETA on the fix at this time.”
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The news comes as the service has seen a relentless onslaught of education benefits-related issues, raising doubts about how well the Army can keep its end of the bargain on education benefits, which are widely seen as a key recruiting tool.
“It’s very frustrating. I’m on the fence on reenlisting, and this isn’t making me feel great about the Army,” one noncommissioned officer told Military.com on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the press. “I wasn’t expecting to use my emergency savings.”
The Army’s tuition assistance is a separate program from the GI Bill, which is managed through the Department of Veterans Affairs. Roughly 100,000 beneficiaries…
