VA or GS pay questions

[navdoc47]

I'm not a psychiatrist, but I figure some of y'all can answer my questions.

I'm occupational medicine, tier 2 (i think). Base pay is $137K for GS15 step 6, locality (market) pay is $100K.

I'm currently making about $22K less than my pay when i started in 2021 ($225K) due to inflation. In other words, at $225K in 2021 dollars, I should be paid $259K in 2023 dollars, with respect to inflation. However current pay is $237K.

My PDPP is supposed to be reviewed soon. Doximity average is $259K for occ med. However data for occ med docs in my local area is likely only found in MGMA, which only large private hospitals pay for (and likely too expensive for me to inquire).

Published pay chart for my specialty, is found in 'Pay Table 1, tier 2', and 2023 max published pay is $260K

First question: what kind of retention incentive pay can I reasonably get? When I signed onto the job, it was only $5K per year. I know that plenty of non-physicians get retention incentives of $25K over 5 yrs (so like $5K per year). This doesn't seem right for a physician, or is it?

Second question: any suggestions to maximize PDPP, and what to expect. (should I expect market pay to go up at the same crappy rate as base pay, which is way below inflation?)

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[vanfanal]

Oooo. Very interesting to hear the answers as I’m in a similar situation. Inflation has left us all feeling poorer….everything is up except physician comp…that has to stay status quo to keep keep exec raises at 12%.

 

[PikminOC]

I'm not a psychiatrist, but I figure some of y'all can answer my questions.

I'm occupational medicine, tier 2 (i think). Base pay is $137K for GS15 step 6, locality (market) pay is $100K.

I'm currently making about $22K less than my pay when i started in 2021 ($225K) due to inflation. In other words, at $225K in 2021 dollars, I should be paid $259K in 2023 dollars, with respect to inflation. However current pay is $237K.

My PDPP is supposed to be reviewed soon. Doximity average is $259K for occ med. However data for occ med docs in my local area is likely only found in MGMA, which only large private hospitals pay for (and likely too expensive for me to inquire).

Published pay chart for my specialty, is found in 'Pay Table 1, tier 2', and 2023 max published pay is $260K

First question: what kind of retention incentive pay can I reasonably get? When I signed onto the job, it was only $5K per year. I know that plenty of non-physicians get retention incentives of $25K over 5 yrs (so like $5K per year). This doesn't seem right for a physician, or is it?

Second question: any suggestions to maximize PDPP, and what to expect. (should I expect market pay to go up at the same crappy rate as base pay, which is way below inflation?)

The government isn't paying for the correct cola? Why not?

 

[Sushirolls]

OCC med that has their own MRO and full spectrum urine testing, with active marketing to local employers should be able to negate all these questions IMO.

Then have the 24/7 emergency testing in case of industrial mishaps, etc

Disability evaluations, too.

*Pssst. Go open your own practice. Pick your town. Pick your community.

 

[comp1]

Hm, I haven't see ANY retention bonuses locally since the kind of national one given out to stop everyone from quitting when COVID hit. This is a problem as there are very often significant hiring bonuses within the government and it can lead to hopping. You seem to be working for the DoD and not the VA? I had never heard of PDPP before and had to look it up. It still seems to be based on VA pay tables.... I don't understand how you would "maximize" your salary... Unless you are the chief occ med physician in charge of the market pay analysis and were looking for tips on how to complete it? I don't think you'd have these particular questions if you were. Anyways, the biennial market pay analysis will determine what your salary will be. I've never seen it go down, but it does stagnate if your local salaries have stagnated. It isn't tied directly to inflation like say Social Security. It's tied to what other physicians are being paid locally, which probably, but not definitely does go up with inflation. Salary is a non-negotiable thing in the government along with a FTE being 40 hours. See if you can negotiate for other perks instead like less call, more telework or some other alternative work schedule.

 

[navdoc47]

After a discussion with my supervisor, it appears there are ZERO pay incentives for retention of government civilian physicians.

Yes I work for Dept of Defense (to answer a previous question).
To answer another question, my correct COLA is mixed in with my physician PDPP pay (also called market pay).

For instance when I look at my LES (ie paystub), it separates my pay into 2 piles: GS15 pay, which is like $137K. The other pile is locality pay which is a combination of locality and market pay (about $100K).

Apparently the PDPP system is somewhat new (physician dentist podiatry pay), and so nothing has been developed beyond that in terms of physician pay.

Sounds like my market pay (PDPP) will be arbitrarily advised - for better or worse - by the CMO (chief medical officer), who gives their input to HR. I say arbitrarily since I don't believe there's any accurate data for my specialty salary in my locality (i'm probably only one of a handful of occ med docs in my county and surrounding counties). And if there is accurate data, it's probably only found in the expensive dataset of MGMA, which I highly doubt that the DOD HR utilizes.

I suspect what will happen is that I will get a 5% raise for my PDPP (physician dentist podiatry pay), just like the pay raise of the GS15 pay portion over the past 2 yrs. Then I can ENJOY an overall 10% pay decrease (since past 2 years was around 15% inflation), due to pay raises not matching inflation. Nevermind the fact that the pay will continue to lag behind inflation for another 2 years before it is reviewed again.

What I still don't understand is the max range for my PDPP:

Federal Register :: Request Access

Above link suggests I'm table 1, tier 2, max of $260K. However I know that if i were working in a more expensive area, like San Diego, the max range for job postings is around $280K. So I wonder what my true max is for PDPP.

 

[vanfanal]

From recent experience, the COLA only applies to the base pay, not overall pay which is the combo of base + market. So when the president announces a 2-4% pay increase, it basically applies to only half your salary. You’ll have to negotiate to get an equal increase in your market pay.

I’ve heard you may be offered retention incentives or increase in market pay if you can show you have a competing offer from somewhere else, and they want to keep you.

Keep us posted.

 

[comp1]

The DoD must work really differently than the VA if they offer personalized financial incentives because of a specific person's issues or other offers... That's definitely not something you see elsewhere in the fed. It's offered to everybody currently employed or nobody.

 

[navdoc47]

On separate issues, full time VA physicians accrue 8 hrs of leave per pay period (1 work day off every 2 weeks):

https://www.navao.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/FactSheet-T38AnnualLeave.pdf

However as a DoD physician, I accrue 6 hrs of leave per pay period since it's based on years of experience (15 yrs of employment = 8 hrs of leave per pay period; 3-15 years of service = 6 hrs of leave per pay period).

Performance bonuses: since at least 2013, performance bonus is up to $15,000 per year at VA. I got the max DHA pay bonus of a whopping $5900 (apparently higher had I still been under navy bumed). I could have chosen 5 days of leave instead of a pay bonus.

I wonder when DoD physicians will ever get compensated to the same level as VA physicians with respect to leave and performance bonuses.

 

[comp1]

Yeah, you get max leave accrual on day 1 as a VA physician. The VA is hiring!