APWU members in the South Jersey area will have an opportunity to attend a Federal Employee Benefits and Retirement Preparation Class at the APWU SJ Hall, located at 900 Route 168, Suite D-3, Blackwood, New Jersey, on Tuesday, April 28, 2026, with sessions available at 10:00 AM and 2:00 PM. The class will be led by George Politarhos, a Principal and Federal Employee Retirement Consultant, and will cover key topics including understanding FERS and CSRS retirement system benefits, avoiding common Social Security mistakes, learning how to reduce unnecessary taxation, and protecting your Thrift Savings Plan while understanding your options at retirement. This session is designed to help postal employees better understand their benefits and make informed decisions as they prepare for retirement, whether they are close to retiring or planning ahead. Attendance is limited, and members are encouraged to reserve a spot by calling 856-228-8090, and to share this information with coworkers so more members can take advantage of this opportunity to strengthen their retirement planning.
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More information on the retroactive pay from Charlie Cash
Retroactive payments owed to the APWU represented employees under the main agreement were made and will show on the April 10, 2026, paychecks. Employees not covered by the main agreement (Nurses, HRSSC, IT/AS, or any Private Sector APWU contract) are not entitled to this payment. You Employees can tell if they are entitled to the payment by looking on their paystub at the column labeled as “RSC” (Rate Schedule Code). If the letter in that column is a P, C, or K, the employee is entitled to a retroactive payment for the hours listed for that RSC.
I have already received many questions about retroactive payments or been told employees did not receive their retroactive payments. Couple things to remember:
This is a relatively short retroactive period of 20 pay periods. It includes one 1.3% pay increase (additional 1% for PSEs) and one COLA for career employees that equates to $0.19 (19 cents) per hour. The COLA only covers 12 pay periods.
Employees should not be comparing their retroactive pay to previous contracts, other union contracts, or even other employees’ payments. Each person’s payment is unique and based on their previously paid hours worked or paid leave.
Some employees will not receive retroactive payments for some, or all of the hours worked or paid. These include employees who were detailed to 204-b positions. As these are EAS details, those employees were paid under the EAS pay scale and not entitled to backpay. An employee who is/was being paid by OWCP would also not receive a payment from the Postal Service. Again, the RSC column on the paystub will detail what pay schedule an employee is for any particle number of hours each week of each pay period.
Employees should review the full long form paystub available on LiteBlue to determine if they received the retroactive pay and to see the details of the payments. I have attached an explanation and an example paystub of an active employee to illustrate how the retroactive payments appear on the paystub. The short form that some receive in the mail or if people look at a pay stub on their smartphones will not provide enough detail to make proper determinations.
Employees who question whether they received the retroactive pay or if it is incorrect must download the full paystub and go over it with their state or local officer/steward. If after this review a question remains, a national, state, or local officer can send the paystub to my office for review. I request that members or non-members do not email us directly. The initial questions must go through the state or local with jurisdiction so we are not inundated with questions that could have been answered by using the explanation and example to review the pay stub at the state or local level.
National, State, or Local Officers who have questions must email the employee’s name, EIN, full paystub, and the specific question being asked to Lee Branca at Lbranca@apwu.org for review and consultation.
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