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Show 1C Katop Air Force News Pay problem Officials offer avenue for pay problem resolution A newly arrived lieuRANDOM'! AFB. Texas (AFPN) tenant at a Pacific Air Force base is not getting his overseas a lot of money counted allowance housing and on to pay the bills. The first thought of local officials: It must be that new personnel database. The lieutenant rolls his eyes. He has now here to turn. The system has sc rewed him up and he faces months of financial headaches. Or not. The people in the Air Force Personnel Center's customer service "call center" here are on the job and have information for the lieutenant immediately. Turns out the solution will come from a quick visit to his local finance office. It was not the new system after all, just a bit of information that needed to be updated. Even if the culprit had been the personnel system's new database, as with many of the calls lately, the call center would have been the right place to get the problem solved, if local officials could not fix it. "We get about 2,000 calls a week and have great success quickly resolving the problem or at least referring it to the cost-of-livin- g call center experts, who work cases directly with the person having the problem." said Master Sgt. David Melnick, call center superintendent here. "We like to cut through the bureaucracy for them." A snapshot of problems called in recently include: New officers not receiving correct pay and allowances; and initial enlistment bonus problems; and Delayed payment of promotion increases for new promo-tee- s. Things like that are a huge inconvenience and cause unnecessary stress in peoples' lives, Melnick said. Often the issue is miscommunication between agencies, units or the service member and personnel or finance officials, so the best place to start is at the local level, he said. The professionals here are committed to getting people answers for those personnel issues that affect their lives," said Col. Michael Schiefer, director of operations here. call center has technicians answering the phones The 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. CDTat (800) 4 or DSN After-hour- s calls are answered by Voice mail so the caller 24-ho- 558-140- 665-294-9. DSN 665-294- 9 (800) 558-140- 4 CDT Open 24 hours can leave a message and get a call back the next duty day. The address is afpc.dpsfm8afpc.randolph.af.mil. When contacting the call center, Melnick said customers should leave a detailed description of their problem and provide: Name; Social Security number; address: and Unit and duty phone. They track every query until it is resolved, Melnick said. "Our technician s are ready to assist any way they can. If we're not the folks who can fix the problem, well find out who can," Schiefer said. Weapon detection device technology gets upgrade KIRTIAM) AIR FORCE BASE. M (AI Individuals rving to sne?k concealed weapons into schools 01 governmental buildings will face greater chances of detection thanks to a Huntington Beach, Calif., electronics firm further developing an Air Force Research technology. Lib-orator- "We've been using the same technology for land mine detection since World War II and it hasn't changed," said Dean Lawry, an electrical engineer with the directorate's plasma branch, microwave division. This technology is incorporated in current security archway systems." Under terms of the agreement, directed energy directorate experts will loan scientific applications officials a prototype device to upgrade and develop devices for schools, government and commercial facilities and public places like museums or amusement parks. The cooperative program allows government high-pow- er walk-throug- y Officials from Scientific Applications & Research h five-ye- ar Associates, Inc., and AFRL's directed energy directorate signed a cooperative research and development agreement Aug. 14 to upgrade weapons detection devices similar to those used a airports, federal facilities and other high security areas. researchers to offer technology they developed to companies to improve, market and produce. Lawry explained the new technology, developed at AFRL in 1995, detects not only the metal objects individuals carry, but can tell if those objects are weapons. The new technology, according to Lawry, emits c a pulse that's absorbed by metal objects like guns and knives. This absorbed energy in turn emits electrical signals, unique to different types of objects, receiver coils within the archway detect. These signals rapidly discriminate between weapons and other low-lev- el electro-magneti- metallic items like belt buckles, keys coins before the person leaves the archway, based on differences in electrical impulses. The archway has seven vertical receiver coils which indicate the concealed object's location. Dr. Parviz Parhami, Scientific Applications & Research Associates, Inc., chief executive and financial officer, noted, The near-tery application of the new weapon detection technology is for school safety since it enables unattended monitoring of all school entrances." He added that the system has the capability of sending photographs to a central office of anyone detected carrying a weapon. high-priorit- low-cos- t, 'raff We have enjoyed serving you by offering quality furniture PS at Rock Bottom Prices. We are closing our store so that Jamie can stay home with our new baby boy, Hunter. 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