60th CPTS keeps up the pace despite job relocations

  • Published
  • By Nick DeCicco
  • 60th Air Mobility Wing Public Affairs
TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. --  Transformation sounds like the sort of word you would expect to hear leaders of a corporation use to talk about changes in the workforce.

But if the men and women of the 60th Comptroller Squadron were wearing civilian clothes instead of camouflage, it would be hard for the untrained observer to know the difference.

They're facing the same types of problems their civilian counterparts encounter with a shrinking staff in the office landscape - most notably, asking a diminishing number of colleagues to handle a stream of work that does not seem to dwindle in coordination.

The challenges are part of an Air Force-wide plan to centralize many tasks in the finance squadron, migrating jobs to Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota.

"It equates to about a 45 percent loss overall, which is a huge gutting," said Tech. Sgt. Bobby Burger, additional duty first sergeant and quality assurance manager for the squadron. "A lot of the people at base-level finance right now are feeling the strain of overtime, the additional hours."

Staff Sgt. Paul Hackett, the squadron's noncommissioned officer in charge of customer support, can speak to the difficulties. His section handles travel entitlements, paying Do-it-Yourself moves, Permanent Change of Station and travel vouchers and maintaining the Defense Travel System. Since arriving at Travis 12 years ago, his section's staffing shrunk from 24 to 14 people, he said.

His area isn't the only one in finance dwindling. However, there's little sense among its leaders that the sky is falling, even as its members work 11 and 12-hour days to process paychecks, oversee transactions, pay vouchers and more.

To ease the blow, finance only receives customers from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.

"We have to [work those hours] because I can honestly tell you that if it was my paycheck and somebody wasn't helping me get it fixed, I'd want somebody to take a few extra minutes to help me out," said Tech Sgt. Tina Bennett, the squadron's NCOIC of customer service.

Sergeant Bennett's section represents the face of finance, the part that deals most often with the members with queries and complaints. The workload may be larger, but Sergeant Bennett is unflinching in her approach for how it's handled.

"We deal with it. We do it. Bottom line," she said. "We're still having the same customers come in requiring the same type of service, so if we're not getting it during duty hours, yeah, we're staying after."
Chief Master Sgt. David Halvorson, squadron superintendent, said the transformation, which affects the squadron's data entry more than its customer service, is forcing everyone to pitch in extra hours to keep pace with demand.

"We won't give up on our numbers," the chief said. "We still have standards that we need to at least attempt to achieve, but so far we're still doing it."

Sergeant Burger said keeping the base population informed about the challenges the squadron faces is paramount, but said the goal of the office is to serve the base population so it can do its jobs.

"What makes the difference between us and a maintainer is a maintainer's job is to turn that wrench to make sure that plane flies," he said. "Our job is to make sure that there are no concerns for that member so that he or she can concentrate on turning that wrench."

But the finance squadron does more than just make sure Airmen, civilians and vendors get paid. That's where Tech. Sgt. Brad Slagal, section chief of financial management analysis, and his cohorts come in.

These Airmen are the number crunchers, the people who track the way money is spent, make sure the base's wings and squadrons stay on course and don't overspend.

They're also the accountants, though he underscores that the goals of a governmental staff are different from a civilian one.

"In corporate accounting, you're working with debits and credits," Sergeant Slagal said. "You're working with the bottom line -- is the corporation making money? What are we spending our money on? -- those types of things. Government accounting, we're not-for-profit. What we're looking for is once we get a transaction that posts to the government's books, is it posting correctly? Is it posting in a timely manner? Did the right folks get charged?"

Chief Halvorson said the comptroller squadron's job may not be one of the Air Force's more glamorous, but hinted that it's a sacrifice he's willing to make so that others can continue to perform their jobs.

"Financial management guys, we're not in the sexy mission so we don't get the funds or the manning to do it," he said. "We're just told to do it. Other jobs, like piloting the plane, you can only have so few crew members before it is just death waiting to happen. For us, it's just overtime."

For more information, call the comptroller squadron at 424-2171.