I was all excited, in spite of the prospects of a long, drawn-out full clearance, that I would be able to start this secret-clearance job this week. Finally! The employer told me several times that it takes them about a month to get the interims cleared in order to start working. But in my last correspondence I was told that, well, it would be more like three months - ? I feel like I’ve been false expectations all this time to keep me on the hook. Now, instead of hanging on by my fingernails until this week (one month later) in my dreadful unemployment state, I’m looking at another two months of waiting, which I can’t financially do. Maybe it does take three months - that’s fine. But I was told “one month” post-job-offer several times, leading me to hold off on other possible jobs in the meantime. Yeah - not happy.
It’s very likely that they don’t have funding for your position right now.
Remember, when you were offered the job, the company had no idea how long it would take you to get cleared. They have to go on and run their business and complete their projects. So, they don’t know what their situation will be when you get cleared.
You can, of course, go out and find other work.
It’s also a possibility you were denied an interim. This happened to me. Was told about a month for interim determination. That time comes and goes, investigation scheduled, credit checked, etc. but for whatever reason was never told outright “you were denied interim.” Since then I have seen several new coworkers hired and received their interim in about 4-5 week’s time. It was obvious my company wasn’t aware at how long full clearances were taking nowadays. This “3 months” could be your company’s estimation on how long the full process might take. Be aware-- if this is indeed the case, it could be much longer than 3 months. I’d find out your exact status in JPAS to be clear.
I’m checking on that now. Yesterday I called the update phone # given by someone else on this forum to check on my investigation status, and I was told that they haven’t even received my paperwork yet(!) So I called my investigation contact (from a previous email) and let him know. He was quite surprised to hear that they hadn’t even begun to process my secret clearance yet. He said he would reach out to them and find out what the issue was and call me back. I still haven’t heard anything back yet - go figure. The movement on these clearances is glacial. They’re hurting themselves, IMHO. Because it takes so long, people are finding good jobs elsewhere much faster and just staying put when finally called about the clearance position they applied for months/years ago. These agencies have no competition - they’re government - so they can take their sweet time and finish whenever. if you don’t like it, you have no recourse.