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The Referral Bonus — $500 Now, $1,000 From July 2026

The state pays a Guard member, a recruit, a retired member or a military department employee for a successful recruitment referral. The payment is $500 and doubles to $1,000 on 1 July 2026, with eligibility widening at the same date. It is taxable income and is reported as such.

Verified August 23, 2026

What this benefit is

The state pays a Guard member, a recruit, a retired member or a military department employee for a successful recruitment referral. The payment is $500 and doubles to $1,000 on 1 July 2026, with eligibility widening at the same date. It is taxable income and is reported as such.

What it's worth: $500 for a successful recruitment referral, rising to $1,000 on 1 July 2026

  • The department states the eligible referrers as current Guard members, current Guard recruits, retired Guard members and military department employees, with the expanded eligibility effective 1 July 2026.
  • The department states plainly that these payments are taxable and must be reported to the federal tax authority.
  • The citation given is Wyo. Stat. 19-9-403(e).

Who is entitled to it

  • You are a serving member of the state National Guard.
  • You are in this state.

Not sure whether that describes you?

Answer a few questions about this benefit specifically — we only ask what this one actually depends on, and we stop as soon as we know.

How to claim it

  1. 1Register the referral BEFORE the person you referred talks to a recruiter on their own. Recruiting bonuses everywhere turn on who is recorded as the source, and an unrecorded introduction pays nothing.
  2. 2If the timing is flexible, note that the payment doubles on 1 July 2026. A referral that completes either side of that date is worth a materially different amount.
  3. 3Retired members are inside the eligibility. A retiree who assumed the bonus was for serving members only is leaving money on the table.
  4. 4Treat it as income when it arrives. The department says directly that it is taxable and reported, so set aside the tax rather than being surprised by it.
  5. 5Ask recruiting what "successful" means for payment purposes — enlistment, shipping, or completion of initial training. That definition sets when you actually get paid.
Form
Referral recorded through the recruiting process
File with
The state military department, through recruiting
No renewal
Once granted it does not need renewing.
Worth knowingRecorded because it is a state payment to an individual under a state statute, which is what this corpus tracks — even though it reads like a recruiting poster. The doubling date is the part worth knowing.
Known gapThe department does not publish an annual limit on how many referrals one person may be paid for, or the point in the recruit's progress at which payment is triggered. Both come from recruiting.

Sources

This finder provides an informational match, not a government eligibility determination. The responsible agency decides your application.