Good Conduct Time Under the Prison Litigation Reform Act

By Elizabeth Franklin-Best, Esq., and Christopher Zoukis, JD, MBA

Program Statement 5884.03 at a glance

Field	Value
Program Statement	P5884.03
Subject	Good Conduct Time Under the Prison Litigation Reform Act
Effective / current edition date	3/31/2006. The PDF header also carries a separate line, “RULES EFFECTIVE: 12/5/2005.”
Change notice	None. This edition has never been amended by a Change Notice.
Supersedes / rescinds	“P5884.01 Good Conduct Time Under the Prison Litigation Reform Act (9/29/97)” (PS 5884.03 at p. 1)
Governing statute	18 U.S.C. § 3624(b)
Governing regulation (28 C.F.R.)	28 C.F.R. § 523.20 — rewritten effective 14 March 2022, 87 FR 7943, after this Program Statement was issued
Related BP forms	None identified in this Program Statement
Official PDF	PS 5884.03, Good Conduct Time Under the Prison Litigation Reform Act

Checked against the BOP policy set · 2026-09-06.

Good conduct time is the credit a federal prisoner can earn against a sentence for complying with institution rules — today, up to 54 days for each year of the sentence the judge imposed. This four-page Program Statement is the Bureau’s instruction for awarding it, and it was written in 2006, which means it predates both the First Step Act’s rewrite of the statute and the 2022 rewrite of the regulation.

Because this page explains how the credit works, not whether a particular sentence can be recalculated, the companion page is good conduct time and early release — that is where disputes, recalculation requests and what to do about a disallowance are handled.

The rule itself: the good conduct time rate and vesting table

There are two tables here, and the difference between them is the whole point of this page.

Table A is the law. It is the current text of the binding regulation, 28 C.F.R. § 523.20, as rewritten effective 14 March 2022. Table B is what the Program Statement still says, reproduced verbatim from the 2006 PDF. Where they conflict, the regulation controls: a Program Statement is the Bureau’s internal instruction, not law.

Table A — the current regulation, 28 C.F.R. § 523.20

Offense date	Rate and conditions, verbatim from the regulation
On or after Nov. 1, 1987 (all sentences over 1 year, other than life)	“The Bureau will award inmates up to 54 days of GCT credit for each year of the sentence imposed by the court.” § 523.20(b)(1)
Partial final year	“The Bureau will award prorated credit for any partial final year of the sentence imposed…” § 523.20(b)(2)
When it is awarded	“An inmate may receive up to 54 days of GCT credit on each anniversary date of his or her imposed sentence… Credit for the last year of a term of imprisonment is awarded the day after the end of the final ‘anniversary period,’ unless the final year is a complete year, in which case credit for the last year is awarded on the first day of the final anniversary period.” § 523.20(b)(3)
Effect	“When the inmate reaches the Bureau-projected release date, the sentence will be satisfied and the inmate will be eligible for release.” § 523.20(b)(4)
On/after Nov. 1, 1987 and before Sept. 13, 1994	“GCT credit is vested once received and cannot be withdrawn.” § 523.20(c)
On/after Sept. 13, 1994 and before Apr. 26, 1996	Yearly awards vest only for inmates who have earned, or are making satisfactory progress toward, a high school diploma, an equivalent degree, or a Bureau-authorized alternative program credit. § 523.20(d)(1)
On/after Apr. 26, 1996 — with education progress	“up to 54 days” per year, if the inmate has earned or is making satisfactory progress toward a high school diploma, equivalent, or Bureau-authorized alternative program credit. § 523.20(d)(2)(i)
On/after Apr. 26, 1996 — without education progress	“up to 42 days” per year. § 523.20(d)(2)(ii)
Noncitizen under a final removal order	A noncitizen subject to a final order of removal, deportation, or exclusion “is not required to participate in a literacy program to earn yearly awards of GCT credit.” § 523.20(d)(3)
How it can be lost	GCT credit may be reduced if an inmate “(1) Commits prohibited acts which result in certain disciplinary sanctions (see part 541 of this chapter); or (2) Fails to comply with literacy requirements in this section and part 544 of this chapter.”

Source: 28 C.F.R. § 523.20, current text, effective 14 March 2022 (87 FR 7943).

Table B — what PS 5884.03 still prints, verbatim

The Program Statement encloses the regulatory text of the day in brackets; the PDF’s own convention is “[Bracketed Bold – Rules] / Regular Type – Implementing Information” (PS 5884.03 at p. 1).

Paragraph	Text, verbatim from the Program Statement
6.a	“For inmates serving a sentence for offenses committed on or after November 1, 1987, but before September 13, 1994, the Bureau will award 54 days credit toward service of sentence (good conduct time credit) for each year served. This amount is prorated when the time served by the inmate for the sentence during the year is less than a full year.”
6.b	“For inmates serving a sentence for offenses committed on or after September 13, 1994, but before April 26, 1996, all yearly awards of good conduct time will vest for inmates who have earned, or are making satisfactory progress (see Sec. 544.73(b) of this chapter) toward earning a General Educational Development (GED) credential.”
6.c(1)	“54 days credit for each year served (prorated when the time served by the inmate for the sentence during the year is less than a full year) if the inmate has earned or is making satisfactory progress toward earning a GED credential or high school diploma; or”
6.c(2)	“42 days credit for each year served (prorated when the time served by the inmate for the sentence during the year is less than a full year) if the inmate has not earned or is not making satisfactory progress toward earning a GED credential or high school diploma.”
6.d	“Notwithstanding the requirements of paragraphs (b) and (c) of this section, an alien who is subject to a final order of removal, deportation, or exclusion is eligible for, but is not required to, participate in a literacy program, or to be making satisfactory progress toward earning a General Educational Development (GED) credential, to be eligible for a yearly award of good conduct time.”
6.e	“The amount of good conduct time awarded for the year is also subject to disciplinary disallowance (see tables 3 through 6 in Sec. 541.13 of this chapter).”
7.d	“If an inmate’s status changes from GED UNSAT (unsatisfactory progress) to GED SAT (satisfactory progress), the annual rate of GCT will return to 54 days. Inmate Systems Management (ISM) staff must recalculate (RPC) the sentence computation to affect change.”
7.e	“An inmate alien subject to a final order of removal, deportation, or exclusion will earn GCT at the annual rate of 54 days (prorated for a partial year at the end of the sentence). After completion of the deportation hearing, the Case Manager or designee will enter the Case Management Activity (CMA) assignment into SENTRY and forward a copy of the order to ISM staff… SENTRY will automatically change the annual GCT rate from 42 days to 54 days.”

Source: PS 5884.03 at pp. 2–4.

The three words that matter: “served” versus “imposed”

Read the two tables against each other and one difference does all the work. The Program Statement says 54 days for each year served. The current regulation and the current statute say up to 54 days for each year of the sentence imposed by the court.

That is not a stylistic edit. Under the old “time served” method, each year of credit had to be earned by a year actually spent in prison, and the credit itself shortened the time available to earn the next year’s credit. The Supreme Court upheld that method in Barber v. Thomas, 560 U.S. 474 (2010), and explained its arithmetic in a line worth quoting exactly: “a prisoner subject to a 10-year (3,650-day) sentence who earns the maximum number of days the statute permits will serve 3,180 days in confinement and receive 470 days of ‘good time’ credit, about 15% of the prison time actually served” (Barber v. Thomas). Four hundred seventy days across a ten-year sentence is roughly 47 days per year, not 54.

Congress changed the text. The First Step Act, Pub. L. 115‑391, § 102(b)(1)(A), struck “beyond the time served, of up to 54 days at the end of each year of the prisoner’s term of imprisonment” and substituted “of up to 54 days for each year of the prisoner’s sentence imposed by the court.” The amendment note is printed in the current U.S. Code text of § 3624. Barber was not overruled — it correctly construed the statute as it then read — but the statutory language it construed no longer exists.

The effective-date note matters too. Section 102(b)(2) provided that the amendment “shall take effect beginning on the date that the Attorney General completes and releases the risk and needs assessment system,” and § 102(b)(3) provided that it “shall apply with respect to offenses committed before, on, or after the date of enactment of this Act [Dec. 21, 2018], except that such amendments shall not apply with respect to offenses committed before November 1, 1987.”

What good conduct time under the PLRA means for you

If you are the person inside: find the good conduct time line

Look at your sentence computation sheet and find the good conduct time line. Two numbers tell you where you stand: the annual rate (54 or 42) and whether the credit shows as projected or earned. If the rate reads 42, that is the education line, not the discipline line — the regulation ties the reduced rate to whether you have earned or are making satisfactory progress toward a high school diploma, equivalent degree, or Bureau-authorized alternative program credit, and the Program Statement is explicit that when the SENTRY assignment flips from GED UNSAT to GED SAT, “the annual rate of GCT will return to 54 days” and ISM “must recalculate (RPC) the sentence computation” (PS 5884.03 at p. 3). That is a fixable problem, and the fix runs through Education, then ISM.

If the rate is right but the total is short, the question is whether days were disallowed through discipline. Disallowance happens in the disciplinary process, not the computation process, so the place to challenge it is the disciplinary record — see the Inmate Discipline Program.

Do not assume anyone can tell you a release date. The Bureau computes it, the Bureau can recompute it, and it moves with discipline, education status and any other credit you are earning.

If you are a family member: what good conduct time is not

The most useful thing you can do is understand what good conduct time is not. It is not parole — federal parole was abolished for offenses committed on or after November 1, 1987. It is not early release for programming; that is a separate system, First Step Act time credits, which can stack on top of good conduct time and is where most of the movement in release dates has come from since 2019. And it is not automatic in the sense of being untouchable: the statute conditions it on “exemplary compliance with institutional disciplinary regulations,” and says plainly that “[c]redit that has not been earned may not later be granted.”

If your family member is a noncitizen with a final order of removal, note the specific rule in both the current regulation and the Program Statement: they earn at the 54-day rate without being required to participate in a literacy program. That rule is frequently misapplied at the institution level, and it is worth checking.

If you are counsel: good conduct time

Three points recur.

First, the vesting rule is statutory and blunt. Section 3624(b)(2) provides that “credit awarded under this subsection after the date of enactment of the Prison Litigation Reform Act shall vest on the date the prisoner is released from custody.” The regulation preserves the older, more favorable vesting rules for pre-PLRA offense dates — § 523.20(c) for offenses before September 13, 1994 (“vested once received and cannot be withdrawn”), § 523.20(d)(1) for the September 1994–April 1996 window. Offense date is therefore the first thing to establish, not an afterthought.

Second, the reduced 42-day rate is an education determination, and it is reviewable. It rests on a “satisfactory progress” finding made by the institution’s Education Department, which the Program Statement describes as an EDI assignment entered into SENTRY (PS 5884.03 at p. 3). That is a record with a decision-maker behind it, which makes it a better target than the arithmetic.

Third, the Program Statement’s cross-references are stale and should not be relied on in a filing. Paragraph 6.e directs the reader to “tables 3 through 6 in Sec. 541.13 of this chapter.” Part 541 was restructured in 2010; the current sanctions table is Table 1 in 28 C.F.R. § 541.3, whose source note runs from 75 FR 76267 (Dec. 8, 2010) through 87 FR 2719 (Jan. 19, 2022). Paragraph 3 of the Program Statement cites “Title 18, U.S.C. § 3624(b)(4)” as the award authority; in the current statute, § 3624(b)(4) is the provision allowing the Director to grant exemptions to the GED requirement, and the award rule sits at § 3624(b)(1). Cite the current provisions.

What changed in the law beneath PS 5884.03

This is a 2006 document sitting on top of law that moved twice underneath it, and no Change Notice has been issued.

What it replaced. PS 5884.03 rescinded “P5884.01 Good Conduct Time Under the Prison Litigation Reform Act (9/29/97)” (PS 5884.03 at p. 1). Its stated reason for existing is narrow: “This Program Statement has been revised, based on 28 CFR 523.20, to exempt aliens subject to a final order of removal, deportation, or exclusion from the ‘satisfactory progress in a literacy program’ provision of the PLRA.” The rules it implemented were effective 12/5/2005.

What moved after it — the statute. The First Step Act of 2018 changed the measuring stick from time served to the sentence imposed, Pub. L. 115‑391, § 102(b)(1)(A). Every “for each year served” phrase in paragraph 6 of the Program Statement is therefore describing a superseded method for offenses the amendment reaches.

What moved after it — the regulation. 28 C.F.R. § 523.20 was rewritten effective 14 March 2022, 87 FR 7943, to track the amended statute. The current text says “for each year of the sentence imposed by the court,” adds the anniversary-date awarding rule at § 523.20(b)(3), and adds the Bureau-projected-release-date rule at § 523.20(b)(4). None of that appears in the 2006 Program Statement.

What moved after it — the cross-referenced policies. The Program Statement’s reference block names “P5270.07 Inmate Discipline and Special Housing Units” and “P5350.28 Literacy Program (GED Standard) (12/1/03).” Both have been replaced: discipline and special housing are now separate statements, PS 5270.09 and PS 5270.12, and the literacy program is now PS 5356.01. The regulation it points to for disallowance tables, 28 C.F.R. § 541.13, no longer exists.

What did not change. The 54/42 education split and the noncitizen literacy exemption survive in the current regulation in substance, which is why this Program Statement is still useful — as a description of the education rule and the SENTRY mechanics, not as a description of the rate.

Where people get stuck on the 42-day rate

“My rate says 42 and I don’t know why”

The 42-day rate is tied to education status, not conduct. Under 28 C.F.R. § 523.20(d)(2), an inmate whose offense was committed on or after April 26, 1996 earns up to 54 days per year if they have earned or are making satisfactory progress toward a high school diploma, equivalent, or Bureau-authorized alternative program credit, and up to 42 days if not. The route is a BP-A0148 Inmate Request to Staff to the Education Department asking what EDI assignment is entered and on what basis, then to ISM asking for a recalculation once it changes. If Education will not act, informal resolution and then a BP-9 within 20 calendar days of the event under 28 C.F.R. § 542.14.

“I have a final order of removal and they still cut my rate”

Both the regulation and the Program Statement say this should not happen: § 523.20(d)(3) provides that such an inmate “is not required to participate in a literacy program to earn yearly awards of GCT credit,” and the Program Statement instructs staff that the Case Manager enters a CMA assignment into SENTRY after the deportation hearing and “SENTRY will automatically change the annual GCT rate from 42 days to 54 days” (PS 5884.03 at p. 4). This is usually an assignment that was never entered. Ask, in writing, whether the CMA assignment is in SENTRY and whether a copy of the removal order is in the Judgment and Commitment file.

“I lost days at a disciplinary hearing”

Good conduct time disallowance and forfeiture are imposed through the disciplinary process, and the sanctions available are set by 28 C.F.R. § 541.3, not by this Program Statement. For a Greatest severity act the regulation authorizes disallowance of “ordinarily between 50% and 75% (27-41 days) of good conduct time credit available for year”; for a Low severity act it authorizes disallowance of “ordinarily up to 12.5% (1-7 days)” for a second violation of the same act within six months. A challenge is an appeal of the disciplinary finding, and a Discipline Hearing Officer appeal goes directly to the Regional Director rather than to the Warden, under 28 C.F.R. § 542.14. That is a deadline trap; see Inmate Discipline Program.

“Nothing comes back when I file”

Use the constructive-denial rule. Under 28 C.F.R. § 542.18 the Warden has 20 calendar days, the Regional Director 30 and the General Counsel 40, and “[i]f the inmate does not receive a response within the time allotted for reply, including extension, the inmate may consider the absence of a response to be a denial at that level.” Diary every filing date. The full path is on our Administrative Remedy Program page.

Related BOP policy on good conduct time

Page	What it covers
Good conduct time and early release	Disputes, recalculation, and what can be done about a disallowance
Sentence Computation Manual (PS 5880.28)	How the sentence is computed, and prior custody credit
First Step Act time credits (PS 5410.01)	The separate earned-time system that stacks on good conduct time
Inmate Discipline Program (PS 5270.09)	Where good conduct time is disallowed or forfeited
Literacy Program / GED (PS 5356.01)	The education requirement behind the 54/42 split
Administrative Remedy Program (PS 1330.18)	BP‑8 through BP‑11, with deadlines
Inmate Request to Staff (PS 5511.08)	The BP‑A0148 cop-out, and how to write one that gets answered
Educational good time, D.C. Code (PS 5885.01)	A different credit, for D.C. Code offenders

Frequently Asked Questions About the Good Conduct Time Policy

Reviewed for legal accuracy by Elizabeth Franklin-Best, Esq., Principal Attorney·September 2026