10th Mountain Soldiers Deploy in Place for Finance Mission

Photo By Sgt. Liane Hatch | Staff Sgt. Shane Hall, with B Detachment, 33rd Financial Management Support Unit, supports the unit's new Commercial Vendor Services mission from the detachment's building on Fort Drum February 2, 2017. Deploying financial missions in place helped reduce military spending and decreased the U.S. footprint on the battlefield.  

NY, UNITED STATES

02.01.2017

Story by Spc. Liane Hatch 

10th Mountain Division Sustainment Brigade Public Affairs Office

Soldiers from B Detachment, 33rd Financial Management Support Unit (FMSU) assumed the Commercial Vendor Services (CVS) Retrograde mission from the B Detachment, 9th FMSU out of Joint Base Lewis-McChord on January 31, and will be deployed in-place at Fort Drum throughout the 9-month rotation.

The mission processes all contract payments that support Soldiers deployed in Central Command, said Cpt. Shannon Boyle, the detachment’s commander.

Boyle emphasized the mission’s importance as her soldiers are expected to make prompt and accurate payments to various foreign service and supply vendors that provide for deployed Soldiers, in order to keep the supply chain funded and reduce overall taxpayer expense.

“As finance Soldiers, our focus is being good custodians of government funds,” she said. “Maintaining those relationships with our vendors is the heart of why we do what we do; if we can’t do our jobs properly, the warfighter down range may not get the resources he or she needs downrange to perform that role.”

Though CVS missions do also operate in deployed environments, using a deploy in-place model of mission support reduces the overall cost of operations that comes with deployment, said Boyle, and also reduces the U.S. footprint on the battlefield.

In preparation for the mission, Soldiers from B/33rd have trained with various agencies and other financial units over the past four months, said Sgt. 1st Emmanuel Dominguez, B/33rd Sergeant. Though CVS missions are the responsibility of financial management Soldiers, he said, they are not part of the Soldiers’ routine training. For most of B Detachment, this will be their first experience carrying out CVS missions.

“The military finance world is broad,” Dominguez said. “Even myself as a senior Non-Commissioned Officer, I never got to touch a CVS mission before, so by allowing us to do this in the rear, it’s a tremendous benefit to our Soldiers in making them more well-rounded in their field.”

In order to adjust for time differences between foreign customers and the Soldiers, the B/33rd is working to establish a reverse cycle battle rhythm, said Dominguez, with Soldiers reporting to work early and performing Physical Training and other requirements in the afternoons.

Spc. Adriene Kearney, the detachment’s invoice receipt lead, is one of only two of the detachment’s Soldiers who have performed CVS duties previously, Dominguez said. Kearney was deployed to Kuwait with the FMSU’s headquarters company, where she performed CVS missions.

Kearney said she feels confident in the unit’s ability to perform their duties because of the training they received.

“We’re very ready for this mission,” she said. “We know it’s important – we see the numbers, we know we’re doing good things, and everyone’s very willing to learn.”

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• Date Taken: 02.01.2017
• Date Posted: 02.02.2017 12:06
• Story ID: 222290
• Location: NY, US