Title 22 › Chapter 52— FOREIGN SERVICE › Subchapter IV— COMPENSATION › § 3962
The President must create pay classes and titles for the Senior Foreign Service and set a pay range for each class. Except for one special case, those ranges cannot be higher or lower than the basic pay rates for the Senior Executive Service under section 5382 of title 5. The Secretary decides where each Senior Foreign Service member is paid inside those ranges. Those decisions must be based on a strong performance system that looks at work and contribution to the Department. The Secretary normally may change a person’s basic rate no more than once in any 12-month period. If the Secretary finds the performance system makes real differences among people, the top pay can be set at Executive Schedule level II and the overall pay cap will match the cap in section 5307(d)(1) of title 5. A career Senior Executive Service member who takes a limited Senior Foreign Service appointment but whose old SES basic pay is higher than the SFS class pay keeps their former basic pay until the SFS class pay equals or exceeds it. After they move, any later increases to the SES basic rate apply to that retained pay at 50 percent of each increase.
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Foreign Relations and Intercourse — Source: USLM XML via OLRC
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Reference
Citation
22 U.S.C. § 3962
Title 22 — Foreign Relations and Intercourse
Last Updated
Apr 5, 2026
Release point: 119-73not60