Discharge of a serviceman on health grounds

What is happening

The fitness category is established, the papers have gone to the personnel branch, and still there is no order, month after month. You are kept in the unit, put on duty rosters, sometimes sent on tasks, although the medical board has already found you unfit.

The other version: the fitness category is worded more mildly than your condition warrants. Discharge on health grounds is then not on the table at all, and the board's finding has to be challenged first.

The ground recorded in the order matters just as much. Payments, housing rights, pension and benefits all follow from that wording, so 'any discharge as long as they let me go' is a poor strategy.

What the law says

• Discharge from military service on health grounds is available where a military medical board finds you unfit, and for certain categories where you are found fit with limitations and consent to such a discharge.
• The basis for it is the medical board finding; without it the personnel branch takes no decision, so the examination is the first step rather than a formality.
• Article 23(1) of Federal Law No. 76-FZ of 27 May 1998 on the Status of Servicemen bars discharge on certain grounds without consent and before housing is provided and preserves a set of guarantees for those discharged on health grounds.
• Discharge on health grounds after a military injury gives rise to payments and compensation, and the causal link itself is recorded in the medical board finding.
• During mobilisation and special legal regimes the list of available grounds is narrowed, and health remains one of the grounds that still work.
• Inaction by the command and an order recording the wrong ground are challenged in the military court within three months of your learning of the breach.

What we do

• We examine the medical board finding: whether the category and the causation wording support a discharge on health grounds.
• Where necessary we first challenge the board's finding, so that the discharge proceeds on the correct ground.
• We prepare the application for discharge, secure its registration and record the date of filing.
• We challenge the inaction of the personnel branch and the commander up the chain of command and before the military prosecutor.
• We file an administrative claim in the military court and run the case to a decision on discharge on the right ground.
• We check the settlement, the payments and the removal from the unit roll, so the discharge does not leave you with debts and lost payments.

What we need from you

• The military medical board finding and the certificate of the wound or illness.
• The application for discharge and proof of its filing, if it has already been submitted.
• The contract, the service record certificate and extracts from orders.
• Medical records: hospital discharge summaries and examination results.
• Answers from the command and the personnel branch, including written refusals.
• A power of attorney for the advocate, together with details of your housing entitlement and length of service.