Federal Employee Advisor Match

FERS Sick Leave Retirement Credit Calculator (2026)

Unused sick leave at FERS retirement converts directly into additional service credit — adding months to the service years multiplied against your high-3 salary. But the math has a hard rule: OPM converts sick leave to full months only, dropping any partial month. A GS-14 with 920 hours of sick leave gets 5 months of credit (870 hours) — the remaining 50 hours count for nothing.

This calculator shows your projected sick leave balance at retirement, the full months of credit you'll receive, what gets dropped, and the exact dollar value to your annual pension — plus a specific optimization insight so you know exactly how many hours to protect.

The conversion rule: OPM converts sick leave at 174 hours per month (based on the 2,087-hour federal work year ÷ 12, rounded). Only full months count. Any remaining hours are permanently dropped — unused sick leave has no cash value and cannot be paid out like annual leave. 1
Find your exact balance on your most recent Leave and Earnings Statement (LES) — typically labeled "SL Balance" or "Sick Leave." Most federal HR portals (e.g., EPP, MyPay) also show it.
Use a decimal for partial years (e.g., 3.5 for 3 years and 6 months). Enter 0 to see credit from your current balance only.
Federal employees accrue 104 hours per year (4 hours per biweekly pay period). Typical usage is 40–60 hours/year. Enter 0 to model maximum accumulation; enter 104 to model zero net growth.
Your high-3 is the average of your 3 highest consecutive years of basic pay (base pay + locality). Use your current salary as a conservative estimate, or your projected salary in your final 3 years.
Enter actual creditable service — do not include sick leave here (that's what the calculator computes). Include military buyback years and civilian deposit years if paid.
Used to determine whether you qualify for the 1.1% annuity multiplier (requires age 62+ with 20+ actual service years).

How OPM converts sick leave to service credit

OPM's conversion formula uses a 174-hour month (2,087 ÷ 12 = 173.92, rounded to 174). Your total sick leave hours at retirement are divided by 174; the whole number is your additional months of service credit. The remainder is dropped — permanently, with no compensation.1

The additional months are added to your actual creditable service years for the annuity calculation:

Annual pension = High-3 × multiplier × (actual service years + sick leave credit months ÷ 12)

The multiplier is 1.0% for most employees, or 1.1% if you retire at age 62 or older with at least 20 years of actual creditable service. Sick leave credit does not count toward the 20-year threshold — it only adds to the total service multiplied at whatever rate you already qualify for.2

Example: GS-14 with 920 hours of sick leave

Why sick leave is worth more than most employees realize

Unlike annual leave, unused sick leave cannot be paid out at retirement — it has no lump-sum cash value. For most of your career, the only benefit of a large sick leave balance is that you have it available if you get seriously ill. But at retirement, those accumulated hours become a permanent pension enhancement.

A federal employee with 1,740 hours of sick leave at retirement earns an entire extra year of service credit — worth $1,450/year in additional pension at a $145,000 high-3 (before accounting for survivor annuity elections). Over 25 years, that's $36,250. The calculation gets even better for employees who qualify for the 1.1% multiplier: the same 1,740 hours becomes $1,595/year and $39,875 over 25 years.

The partial-month trap: where most employees lose value

The most common planning mistake is ending up with a large partial month at retirement. If you retire with 450 hours of sick leave, you get 2 full months of credit (348 hours) and 102 hours are dropped. Those 102 hours required roughly 25 biweekly pay periods (over a year) to accrue — and they contribute exactly $0 to your pension.

To avoid this, run the calculator with your planned retirement date and see how many hours will be dropped. Then consider two options:

  1. Delay retirement by a few pay periods. Each biweekly pay period adds 4 hours of sick leave. If you need 72 more hours to hit the next full month, that's 18 pay periods — about 9 months. If the pension increase is worth more than the 9 months of foregone annuity, delay makes sense.
  2. Use down to the next full-month boundary. If you have 450 hours and want to retire on your planned date, using exactly 102 hours of sick leave before retirement leaves you with 348 hours (exactly 2 full months). No waste. This requires intentional tracking in your final months.
Sick leave vs. annual leave at retirement: Annual leave pays out as a lump sum (calculated at your rate of basic pay) — use it or get cash. Sick leave cannot be cashed out — it only converts to service credit at retirement. Never trade annual leave for sick leave, and avoid using sick leave once you have enough for a clean month boundary. Use your annual leave strategically before the leave year deadline (January 9, 2027 for leave year 2026).

Does sick leave count toward TSP, Social Security, or the FERS supplement?

No to all three:

Related tools and guides

  • Sick Leave & Annual Leave at Retirement — Full Guide — 174-hour conversion rule, annual leave lump-sum calculation, leave year deadline, and timing your retirement date to maximize both.
  • When to Retire from the Federal Government — 6 interacting variables including sick leave optimization, annual leave lump-sum timing, high-3 timing, FEHB 5-year rule, and TSP Rule of 55.
  • FERS Retirement Calculator — Enter your projected high-3 and service years (add your sick leave credit months) to model total retirement income including FERS annuity, supplement, TSP, and Social Security.
  • FERS High-3 Salary Optimization — The other major lever in your pension formula: step increase timing, promotion timing, locality pay, and the 1.1% multiplier threshold at age 62 with 20 years.
  • OPM Retirement Application Guide — Submitting SF-3107, document checklist, best retirement dates in 2026, and how OPM calculates interim pay.

Model your full retirement income with a specialist

Sick leave credit is one piece of the FERS annuity puzzle. A federal benefits specialist can run the full analysis: optimal retirement date (balancing sick leave credit, annual leave payout, high-3 timing, and FEHB 5-year rule), survivor annuity election, FEHB in retirement, TSP withdrawal sequence, and IRMAA planning — calibrated to your actual situation and retirement-eligibility date.

Fee-only · No commissions · Federal specialists · Free match

  1. OPM CSRS/FERS Handbook Chapter 50 — Creditable Service (opm.gov). Sick leave credit for FERS employees: 174 hours per month (2,087-hour work year ÷ 12). Partial months dropped. FERS sick leave has counted as creditable service since January 1, 2014 (originally phased in at 50% credit starting 2009 under the NDAA FY2009). Also: 5 U.S.C. § 8415 — FERS annuity formula.
  2. OPM — FERS Annuity Computation (opm.gov). The 1.1% multiplier applies when the employee retires at age 62 or older with at least 20 years of creditable service (5 U.S.C. § 8415(a)). Sick leave credit cannot be used to reach the 20-year threshold per 5 U.S.C. § 8415(f): "Sick leave credited as service under this subsection shall not be used to determine the eligibility for an immediate annuity under section 8412."
  3. OPM — FERS Annuity Supplement (opm.gov). The supplement formula uses SS benefit at 62 × (FERS service years ÷ 40), where service years means actual creditable service under 5 U.S.C. § 8421 — sick leave credit is excluded from supplement eligibility and computation.
  4. OPM — Sick Leave General Information (opm.gov). Accrual rate: 4 hours per biweekly pay period for full-time employees (104 hours per year); no limit on accumulation; no payout at retirement or separation (unlike annual leave). Verified May 2026.

Sick leave conversion rate (174 hours per month), annuity multiplier thresholds, and supplement formula verified against OPM CSRS/FERS Handbook and 5 U.S.C. §§ 8415, 8421. Values and rules current as of May 2026. No year-specific tax rates affect this calculator — FERS annuity multipliers are statutory and unchanged.