The military still has no solution to the sky-high cost of moving pets to new duty stations

Military relocation officials had no update on Friday as to whether or when troops could get help relocating their pets as part of a permanent relocation.

A senior Pentagon official told families in May that he would “consider” reimbursing pet shipping costs. But Rick Marsh, the assistant director of strategic plans, policies, and logistics for the U.S. Transportation Command, declined on Friday to comment on whether a refund is still being considered.

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“This is a personnel and entitlement issue that I shouldn’t be speculating about,” Marsh said during the Military Family Caucus annual meeting, which was broadcast live on Friday.

While the cost of moving family members to and from duty stations is covered by the Department of Defense through grants or reimbursements, moving pets is not. New military relocation restrictions, stop movement orders, and changes in commercial airlines sparked by the COVID-19 pandemic have resulted in some military family members paying thousands of dollars to move pets to and from their overseas stations.

Still, Marsh said the relocation of troops and military families over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic has forced military transportation officials to focus their policies on the people being moved, rather than just the logistics of the move.

“Traditionally, we’ve focused on moving people’s things, the logistics,” said Marsh. “A compelling function of COVID has been that there is unprecedented communication between the staffing community and transporters about a staffing issue that happens to have a really large logistical component.”

This realignment, coupled with the ongoing aftermath of a disastrous 2018 moving season, has spurred officials to post a multitude of updates on how families experience moving and working with moving companies. These changes include the requirement that moving companies pass background checks; higher reimbursements for personally procured removals; more choice when repairing or replacing damaged items; clearer communication processes and a single contact person; longer damage windows and faster processing; and notifications during transport.

Officials are also working harder to ensure families know their rights when working with packaging and moving companies, Marsh said.

“It wasn’t a new authority, but I don’t think we’ve ever articulated very well before that you are ultimately in control of who comes into your house,” he said. “You have the authority to say ‘stop’ and have someone help you.”

Marsh said that while they are still expecting more feedback on the 2020 summer moving season, customer satisfaction appears to have improved compared to previous years.

“I’m not ready to declare victory yet, but we’ve seen some improvement in our customer satisfaction scores,” he said. “Two or three years ago we were still in the 90s in terms of customer satisfaction. Right now we’re at around 96%. I expect that number will go down as we get more surveys after the summer move.”

– Amy Bushatz can be reached at [email protected].

Connected: Pentagon is considering reimbursing pet shipping costs during the pandemic

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