One of those times would be now.
This is the way the military works. If you are married and live off post, you receive a thing called BAH. It stands for 'Basic Allowance for Housing', it is based on geographic duty location, pay grade and dependency status.
If you live on post, you don't receive BAH because everything is paid for (too a certain extent). Our rent, water and trash are paid for and our electricity as long as we don't go over a certain amount.
Well, we were receiving BAH while Tim was in training. I was using it to bring down a lot of the debt that was acquired last year from Madison's hospital bills and the debt we had to put on credit cards when Tim's work slowed down last spring. I was using the BAH to lower our bills enough that we would be able to live comfortably off the military pay and my plan has been working wonderfully until Tim got to his duty station.
Tim in processed which changed our duty location and dropped our BAH down $200. Then we were put on a housing list and received a house faster than we expected and then we had car issues and had to drop $100+ into a new battery for our car. So basically we were thrown for a loop financially.
Not only that but Tim has been driving the hour plus drive to and from post every day, which takes a quarter tank of gas a day, which is adding up quickly. Last week when we signed our contract for our house on post, they charged us a prorated amount for our house since we had already received BAH for the month of July. That took another huge chunk of change that we hadn't expected for the month of July.
So we have this house that the Army won't allow us to move into yet, because they didn't arrange my husband's moving brief til tomorrow morning. So Tim is still driving back and forth but now we aren't receiving the BAH to pay for his gas.
I could just scream with how dumb the military can be at times. Why would you set up a house for a soldier to move into, charge him for it and then not allow him to move into the house which he is paying for?!
As of tomorrow our storage lease is up and we have to have everything moved out or they will charge us another months rent(which we can't afford because the storage bill was also coming out of his BAH). But the Army not approving our move *yet* and not willing to pay for a moving truck til it's approved is putting quite the damper on my mood and on our budget.
Someone please send up a prayer for me that this is taken care of and quickly. I knew it was too good too be true. :(
1 comment:
You and your family will always be in my mind and "prayers"...
But I know this isnt funny but damn did it make me laugh...and not for your disconfort but for the predictability of the military. They promis you the world and then screw you giving you the benifits. This will pass I promis Tara and you will be FINE! You learn from this type of thing and you have knowledge because of it to be able to take with you to your next duty station or to a friend that might be moving and have the same problem.
Please look at it positive though..I have seen this happen to people that did not have anywhere to stay because the lease on their houses or apartments were up. You have a place to stay, a car to drive, and two very healthy children. I know you will pull out of this with your chin raised and your family intact....I also know how frustrating this is for you though. If you need any advice or help through anything PLEASE dont hesitate to ask.
If you really need it Tim can get a AER Loan...this is a loan interest loan that the military can give you...maybe this would help pay off all of your debt and get you on your feet. They will take that loan and break it up over 12 months for you to pay back. Alot of people do that before deployments so they can get completely out of debt by the time they get back. Mark and I had to do it his first 2 deployments and it did help.
Anyway Im here for you!
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