With each day that passes, more uncertainty is injected into the work-from-home situation at the USPTO. Now it seems the Office of Personnel Management is offering early retirement (memo dated January 28, 2025) for those who wish to avoid having to return to the office.
It seems that every employee of the USPTO now has an option, between now and February 6, 2025 (which I note is a mere eight days from now) to hand in a “deferred resignation letter”. This would give the employee some seven months of pay and benefits, running out on an effective resignation date of September 30, 2025. The memo explains:
Deferred resignation exempts those employees who choose it from return-to-office requirements.
According to the memo, this buyout offer extends to every USPTO employee other than “positions specifically excluded” by the USPTO management. This puts a staggering burden and time pressure for USPTO management to figure out, within the next few days, which “positions” to “specifically exclude”.
You can see a page on OPM’s web site detailing this retirement offer.