Army Forms Archive

DA Form 647 — PERSONNEL REGISTER

personnel register

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DA Form 647 belongs to the DA series of Department of the Army publications. Its official title is PERSONNEL REGISTER, and its stated purpose is personnel register. Edition in force: 06/01/2010. Publication status: ACTIVE. Length is 2 page(s), with roughly 200 fields available for entry.

The office of primary responsibility is G-1. Use is prescribed by AR 600-8-6, PAM 600-8-1, which defines when the form is raised and where it goes afterward. The form is normally completed by the subject of the entries or by administrative personnel maintaining the record, then reviewed and signed as the governing authority directs.

Distributed formats: PDF, XFDL. The layout is common to all of them; what varies is the method of entry. The pdf is the reference version. In the fillable pdf the entry areas are live objects that accept typing; in the printable version the same areas are inert and are filled by hand after printing.

The pdf displays in current browsers and in any reader application. For fillable use a full reader is preferable to a browser viewer, since viewers vary in whether entered data is retained. An xfdl file is available too. The format is IBM Lotus Forms, in use across Army form systems, and it opens only in the Lotus Forms Viewer.

Download of every format is free and requires no account. Files are served as published, without alteration to the page image.

What the form asks for

  • ContentArea1
  • DATE
  • DATE_A
  • DATE_A_1
  • DATE_A_10
  • DATE_A_11
  • DATE_A_12
  • DATE_A_13
  • DATE_A_14
  • DATE_A_15
  • DATE_A_16
  • DATE_A_17
  • DATE_A_18
  • DATE_A_19
  • DATE_A_2
  • DATE_A_20
  • DATE_A_21
  • DATE_A_22
  • DATE_A_3
  • DATE_A_4
  • DATE_A_5
  • DATE_A_6
  • DATE_A_7
  • DATE_A_8

Entry proceeds block by block in the order printed on the page. Identifying particulars occupy the head of the form: name, identification number, unit or organisation, and date of preparation. These fields govern how the record is later retrieved from the file, so they are completed before any substantive block.

Interactive fields are filled by typing into them. Movement between fields is by tab, following the order established when the form was constructed, which usually tracks the page layout. Check boxes and radio groups are set by clicking, and exclusive groups permit one selection at a time. A one-line field has no wrap: text beyond its width prints truncated even when the screen shows it. Overlong content is placed in remarks or on a continuation, not forced into the field.

The signature block is the final entry, made by hand or by an authorised electronic method, and without it the document remains a draft. Countersignatures — review, approval, witness — are added in the sequence printed, dated at the moment of signing and not at preparation. Empty mandatory fields lead the list of defects; an inapplicable field is annotated as such, not passed over. Behind it come digit transposition in identification numbers, day-month inversion in dates, and residual entries surviving from a reused copy in place of a blank form.

A Privacy Act statement appears on the form where personal information is collected. It sets out the authority for collection, the purpose, the routine uses, and whether disclosure is mandatory or voluntary. The statement is read before entry, not after. Completed copies carry personal data and are handled and stored under the safeguards applicable to that data.

Disposition of the completed document follows the prescribing authority — delivery to the office it names, transmission through the unit administrative channel, or placement in the individual's record, according to circumstance. The preparer keeps a copy. Retention is governed by the applicable records schedule, not by office custom.

Associated documents are located through the series and number scheme. Forms in the DA series with the same proponent or the same prescribing directive tend to be used as a set, and any form named on the face of another normally accompanies it. Continuations, cover sheets, and transmittals fall into this category and are gathered before the package is sent.

An edition stands until the proponent issues a revision. The printed edition date identifies the version, and a copy held locally is checked against the edition now in force before reuse. Prior executions under a superseded edition are not reopened for that reason.

What is offered here are copies of published Department of the Army documents, made available for download. The site is independent of the Department of the Army and publishes no forms of its own. The material is informational and not legal advice, and no statement is made about whether any office will accept a given document. Questions of entry, requirement, or eligibility go to the proponent or the servicing administrative office.

Questions and answers

What is DA Form 647?
PERSONNEL REGISTER
Which edition is current?
06/01/2010
Who is responsible for this form?
G-1
In which formats can it be downloaded?
PDF, XFDL, PDF

Publisher notes

  1. 01-REQUIRED FOR MOBILIZATION USE (AT HOME SITE)
  2. 04-PUB NOT RELEASABLE TO FOREIGNERS (NOFORN)
  3. 42-ITEM ONLY PRODUCED IN ELECTRONIC MEDIA

Other forms in the series