Foreign Service

This report examines foreign service agencies' compliance with provisions of the Foreign Service Act of 1980, which permits limited career extensions. Under that legislation, agencies can use limited career extensions to retain senior-level foreign service officers beyond the mandated time limits of their careers. Specifically, GAO discusses: (1) whether limited career extensions were granted in compliance with the law and agencies' policies; (2) the number and percentage of eligible employees granted such extensions; and (3) the effect that these extensions have on promotion opportunities for lower graded staff.

GAO found that: (1) although the agencies generally complied with applicable laws and regulations, they had differing policies and practices for granting limited career extensions, in particular regarding eligibility requirements; (2) the Department of State mistakenly dropped the law's rank order requirement in 1990, but subsequently reinstated it in its policy; (2) the Agency for International Development (AID) did not always follow its policy to grant extensions only to individuals whom its selection board had considered and recommended, or its selection board's rank order of candidates in granting extensions; (3) although the number and percentage of extensions varied by agency, all agencies except one granted extensions to over half their eligible personnel, with State and AID granting the most extensions because they had larger pools of eligible candidates; (4) State and AID have revised their policies to reduce the number of extensions they grant; and (5) extensions limited promotion opportunities by restricting access to the top salary grades.