A military paycheck is confusing. Why on earth do they need so many boxes? What do they all mean?

Most important. Where is my money going?

There is so much information on the LES (Leave and Earnings Statement) that I am going to break it down into 4 articles to not make this overwhelming. So pull out your LES and let's get started!

The design of an LES is a product of the DOD so I am unable to provide an exact copy of what I wanted, so this will have to do. This link (A) USAF-FDSO-Topic1-Sample LES-Handout-2019.pdf will take you directly to the Defense.gov website and provide you more information if you are intersted.

The top section is pretty easy to understand, so that is where we will start. In the first line of imformation you will find the service members name, last four of their SSN, Current Grade, Entry of service date for pay purposes, Years of Service, Branch of Service, Financial Disbursing Station (Which bank location your pay will come from), and Pay Period Covered (this is usually one month).

Now for the fun stuff, "Entitlements" a.k.a what you get paid! This will include your base pay any BAS, BAH, specilaty, or serperation pay. The the bottom of the box it will say TOTAL and will show you they total amount of money that you have made. Next box is labeled "Deductions". This will show everything that comes out of your paycheck, such as taxes, life insurance, and TSP. This will include your mid-month paycheck. The bottom box will show you the total of your Deductions. "Allotments" will be other things that you have going different places, and things like Tricare Dental. The total of the allotments will be in the bottom box. These figures will be listed again in the column on the left side, finally providing you "NET AMT", net pay, you received. There is a spot under that for "CR FWR", which is "the dollar value of all unpaid pay and allowances due to reflect on the next LES as the +AMT FWD. Finally, we reach EMOM Pay (End of Month).

The final two boxes in this section are DIEMS, which is the date of initial service entry, and Ret Plan, which is the retirement plan you are in.

I know that was a lot to take in! We will break down the section on taxes in the next post.

If you are interested in reading what the DFAS put out about your LES follow this link: Army_reading_your_LES.pdf