Finance services: Keeping green in your pocket Published May 10, 2013 By Senior Airman Mike Tryon 90th Missile Wing Public Affairs F. E. WARREN AIR FORCE BASE, Wyo. -- When people think of finance, they may become stressed, but the members of the 90th Comptroller Squadron are here to help put Airmen's minds at ease when it comes to their pay. "We deal with multiple facets of your pay," said 2nd Lt. Stefan Choquette, 90th CPTS Financial Services officer. "Our goal is to ensure and provide financial, personal reliability readiness 100 percent of the time to 100 percent of those working here." There are several programs, such as LeaveWeb and the Defense Travel System, finance oversees to ensure Airmen get their pay. Comptrollers are responsible for maintaining LeaveWeb, which is the online leave monitoring system the Air Forces uses, Choquette added. Warren was the test base for Air Force Global Strike Command regarding the latest LeaveWeb system update. "Prior to LeaveWeb 4, the current version of LeaveWeb, certain leave requests and situations would require members to submit written requests for leave," he explained. "Now, everything is online." In regards to DTS, finance's newest capability allows it to work with civilian dependant medical travel vouchers, Choquette said. "As a result of realigning our workflow and some other changes to the system, our team has reduced the amount of time it takes for a medical travel voucher to pay out from up to 15 days down to three days," he added. Another addition to the way finance conducts their business is the recent stand-up of an imbedded finance office in the 90th Security Forces Group. "The SFG is the largest group on this base, and it was easier, and made more sense, for us to go to them," Choquette said with a grin. "Once we imbedded ourselves with them, a lot of the financial and in-processing issues their Airmen were having, disappeared." The integration has worked so well, Choquette said, that the comptroller squadron earned the Air Force Financial Management Special Acts and Services award for the effort. According to him, large-unit finance incorporation is the "way-of-the future" and more bases are starting to implement the "All Things Financial" concept. In addition, budget management is being added to the team over the next year. A change Choquette says has really helped improve the financial customer satisfaction is the addition of Master Sgt. Jenell Chalk, 90th CPTS flight chief. "She moved here and really knows her stuff," he explained. "Chalk is a true 'finance hero,' and she's gone into all of our programs and has helped change the mindset of 'you shouldn't be getting paid this, so we're going to take it' into that of 'how can we help you get all that you deserve.'" Without the existence of the 90th CPTS, the individual Airmen would be responsible for looking after their own paychecks and noticing any potential errors associated with them. If there were errors, the Airmen would then have to figure out themselves how to fix them. "I think my favorite aspect of the job is ensuring an Airman is receiving the correct pay," Choquette said. "If a member does owe a debt, I've instructed my Airmen to validate the debt to make sure he or she actually owes the Air Force money." Financial services Airmen validate these debts by looking into and using the regulations and Air Force Instructions to their fullest extent possible, he added. If the Airmen actually do owe the debt, comptroller personnel are looking to find ways to help lessen the impact to an Airman. "Your pay should be the last thing on your mind while you're focusing on the mission at hand," Choquette said. "On the other hand," he went on to say, "if you aren't receiving enough pay, my troops are looking into the regulations to see if there is anything to do to get you the pay you deserve." One of the best things Airmen can do to help verify they are receiving the correct pay is to read their Leave and Earnings statements, Choquette said. "If an Airman understands his LES, then he'll know if something is wrong," he said. "Supervisors need to take the time to help explain to their Airmen what is on their LES and how to look for discrepancies. If you're looking over your LES and notice something has changed on it that you don't think should've changed -- good or bad -- come in and talk to us, we'll do what we can to square you away." A way finance helps ensure the correct information is on a member's LES is by conducting their in-house, monthly audits. "During these audits, we work with the 90th Force Support Squadron, base housing and AFGSC to verify the information in Military Personnel Data System and Defense Enrollment Eligibility Reporting System matches the member's pay record," Choquette said. Along with working with the active-duty, civilian and dependent populations here, the finance office, on occasion, has access to help the retiree community with their financial concerns. "For tomorrow's Retiree Appreciation Day, we will be open to help facilitate retirees' financial issues," Choquette said.