Emergency Essential Employee's FEGLI Election Opportunity

Public Law 106-398, enacted 30 October 2000, allows Department of Defense employees who are designated emergency essential under 10 United States Code Section 1580 an opportunity to elect Federal Employees Group Life Insurance (FEGLI). If you have previously waived FEGLI coverage, P.L. 106-398 allows you to enroll in Basic FEGLI coverage. This law does not provide an opportunity for employees already enrolled in FEGLI to increase existing FEGLI coverage.
Please review your most recent SF 50, Notification of Personnel Action, item 27 to determine if you have FEGLI coverage. If you have previously waived FEGLI coverage, the code reflected in item 27 will be BO and will state "waived". You may also review your current enrollment by accessing the Army Benefits Center - Civilian (ABC-C) https://www.abc.army.mil/ select "Benefit Change", next select "Life" and then "Personal Transactions".

If you are designated as an Emergency Essential Employee you may make an election for FEGLI Basic under this P.L. 106-398 by completing the SF 2817, Life Insurance Election. You must complete item 2, date and sign item 3. To expedite processing of your election please add the remark, "election made under the authority of P.L. 106-398", in item 6, Agency Remarks. The SF 2817 must be completed and signed and mailed within 60 days of your designation as Emergency Essential to the ABC-C for processing. The ABC-C address is: SW CPOC, ABC-C, 301 Marshall Avenue, Fort Riley, KS 66442-5004. You will be able to verify that the election has been correctly processed by reviewing your Leave and Earnings Statement. The effective date of the election will be the day the SF 2817 is received at ABC-C. The automated system will not accept changes to FEGLI based on P.L. 106-398.
You do not have to be performing the duties described in 10 U.S.C. Section 1580 to be eligible for this election opportunity; the only criterion is that you are "designated" as emergency essential under this section. The relevant portion of Section 1580 of Title 10 is provided for clarification.

Title 10 Sec. 1580. Emergency essential employees: designation

(1) It is the duty of the employee to provide immediate and continuing support for combat operations or to support maintenance and repair of combat essential systems of the armed forces.

(2) It is necessary for the employee to perform that duty in a combat zone after the evacuation of nonessential personnel, including any dependents of members of the armed forces, from the zone in connection with a war, a national emergency declared by Congress or the President, or the commencement of combat operations of the armed forces in the zone.

(3) It is impracticable to convert the employee's position to a position authorized to be filled by a member of the armed forces because of a necessity for that duty to be performed without interruption.

If you do not currently have FEGLI, please review your life insurance policies for clauses that might prevent payment of a benefit to your survivors in the event of your death while performing the duties described above.

You may contact the ABC-C at 1-877-ARMY-CTR (1-877-276-9287) if you have questions regarding your eligibility or procedures for making this election.