Grade Waiver Inquiry

[Tsircou]

Professional Soldiers,

I have put my official request into the USAF for a early release from my contract, to be effective October 27th 2014, in hopes of obtaining a 18X contract.

The only problem is that I'm currently an E-5 and the prior service business rule's state that 18X contract are only open to E-1 through E-4. Through quite a bit of research I've found that this is a waiverable situation.

As it stands now I'm at risk of being separated from the Air Force and not having a 18X contract available. This is the worst case scenario but I'd be willing to do just about anything to ensure that I'm afforded this opportunity. To include enlisting as another MOS and dropping a SF packet at a later date.

My questions to this community are this.

1. What is the likelihood of a pay-grade waiver being approved given the current state of the Army's SF needs, who is the approval authority, and what is the process for this? So I might know who to reach out to.

2. How difficult is to get picked up for SFAS as a fresh prior service E-5 in the Army serving in a non-related MOS?

3. If my recruiter does not seem competent with SF recruiting should I contact another recruiter? I'm currently stationed in Alaska and the closest SF recruiter is in Washington. I don't want to be short changed and not have the right chains pulled to make this waiver fly.

Thank you all for all the information you've already provided on these forums and all that you have done and continue to do.

Respectfully,

- Tsircou

[Tsircou]

Here's an update to my status.

My 368 that was signed by my chain has been given to my recruiter. She pushed the 368 up to the powers that be along with a pay-grade waiver so I can enlist into the 18X program as an E-5. My recruiter stated that she's seen these waiver go through before and that I shouldn't worry.

With both sides of the field being worked now all that's left to do is to PT more and continue getting mentally ready. I'm feeling really optimistic about this. If it's in the cards, this dream is going to be a reality.

Thank you all again for all the great information on these boards.

[hueygunner]

I just wanted to add on to this post, in case others are in the same boat as far as trying to enlist as 18X as E-5 or above.

My recruiter completed my grade determination waiver, and even though he was absolutely convinced that I would be bumped down to E-4 (since I've been off active for 6 years), the Army gave me E-5.

Now, I just happened to have a super helpful recruiter who really went to bat for me, so he pushed for a waiver, and I officially signed my 18X contract as an E-5.

So with mine and Tsircou's situations (at least as of Feb 2014), it is possible. It takes a lot of red tape and your recruiter has to pull strings, including getting SF recruiting involved, but if you want it, it can be done!