Let me start by saying it took 45 days from the time I submitted my application and resume on line to get the phone interview appointment and another 46 days till I recieved an offer. A human resource rep. contacted me to schedual the interview with a department lead person, on the day of the interview the phone call came to me 10 minutes late, he wasn't the person who HR said it would be, and apologised for being late and stated he almost forgot the appointment. The interview was fairly standard with the questioning and I had the opportunity to ask some questions as well. Because the position I was applying for is across country, a friend suggested I ask if relocation expences would be offered so I did. He directed me to ask human resources. 46 days later I receive an offer by phone, because I have not worked for a few months I quickly accepted the offer and asked questions later, hindsight told me I should have asked questions first. About relocation expences, I was told only salary positions get compensation, hourly unionized positions do not, its not in their contract. I'm not sure if I had asked for it before accepting the offer it would have made a difference or not.... Food for thought. Another major issue, I was told it takes 12 to 14 weeks to get security clearance through the DoD before they can give me a start date. News reports from the local area are stating major backlogs in getting securty clearence that would normally take 40 days for secret and 80 days for top secret but in reality could take as much as a year. At this point I'm about 10 weeks in hoping the 12 to 14 week estimate wait time is accurate. After discovering this security clearence pitfall I called HR and the rep. stated EB is working on starting some people without the clearence, but that it could take some time to do because its never been done before. I hope this was helpful for you.