Start here if you have been told to submit DD Form 553. First, know what you are filling: Deserter/Absentee Wanted by the Armed Forces. The document is titled DD Form 553, Deserter/Absentee Wanted by the Armed Forces, March 2015.
Next, check the edition. You want not stated, currently carried as not stated by the publisher. Then confirm the form applies to you — this is a Department of Defense form, so you use it whether you serve in the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, Space Force or Coast Guard under Defense jurisdiction.
After that, turn to timing. The requirement comes from not stated; the form is maintained by not stated. Local implementing instructions fill in the dates, so check with the office that will receive your copy.
Finally, decide how you will complete it. You can type into a fillable file or print a blank and write by hand, and the rest of this page walks you through both paths in order.
Begin at the top and move down. Enter your identifying data first, then the body of the form, then the signature block. The sequence is printed in that order because entries below frequently follow from entries above.
Check the edition before you type a word. The date appears on the face of the form; it should read not stated. When it does not, discard the file and take a fresh copy from this page. Department-level revisions replace the blank across all services simultaneously, which means an old printout can be out of step everywhere.
For questions about a specific entry, check the form's own instructions, and if that does not settle it, open not stated. The directive controls where they differ.
Download the form
Step one is picking the format. You have PDF to choose from, across 3 pages, with approximately 79 fields to complete.
Take the pdf if you are unsure. Then check which kind you have: if the boxes highlight when you click them, you have a fillable pdf and can type straight into it, and your entries save with the file. If nothing highlights, you have a printable pdf — send it to a printer and use black ink.
Type when you can. Printed entries stay legible after the form is scanned, copied and forwarded, and handwriting often does not survive that trip. If you must write by hand, use block capitals and press firmly.
Whichever you pick, you pay nothing — every format here is a free download. One last tip: open your pdf in a desktop reader rather than in a browser tab, because browser viewers sometimes drop the interactive fields you need.
What the form asks for
- 2. To (Local, state or federal law enforcement authority as indicated by Military Deserter Information Point).
- 3. From (organization or activity and place from which absent).
- e. Race. Press space bar to mark X if American Indian/Alaska native.
- X if Asian.
- X if Black or African American.
- X if native Hawaiian or Pacific islander.
- X if decline to respond.
- X if white.
- 1. Date prepared (4 digit year, 2 digit month, 2 digit day, no dividers).
- 4. Distribution.
- 5. Absentee identification. a. Name (last, first, middle initial).
- b. Grade/rank/rate.
- c. Sex.
- d. Ethnicity. X first box if Hispanic or Latino, second box if not Hispanic or Latino, or third box if decline to respond.
- f. Place of birth (city, state, country).
- g. Date of birth (4 digit year, 2 digit month, 2 digit day).
- h. Height.
- i. Weight.
- j. Eye color. X first box if black, second box if blue, third box if brown, fourth box if green, fifth box if gray, sixth box if hazel, or seventh box if violet.
- k. Hair color. X first box if auburn, second box if black, third box if blond, fourth box if brown, fifth box if gray, sixth box if red, seventh box if silver, eighth box if white, or ninth box if bald.
- l. DIP control number.
- m. Branch of service.
- n. Social security number. Do not include dashes.
- o. Citizenship.
Submit the completed form through the channel not stated or your local guidance specifies. Save a copy for yourself before it leaves your hands, whether that means a scan, a photograph or a duplicate file.
If the form points you to another document, you can find it by number alone. DD numbering runs across the whole Department, so you do not need to work out which service issued it — one number, one form, everywhere.
Here is where people go wrong. They see a number in an instruction and download whichever form matches it. But DA and DD are separate systems — Army-specific in one case, Department-wide under not stated in the other — so check which series you were sent to before you take the file.
Come back and check the edition next time you need this form. Editions change when the prescribing directive is reissued, when the information collected changes, or when the required notice language is updated, and none of those events reaches you directly. Verifying not stated at the moment you download is the whole defence.
Before you go, note what is not covered here. You have the blank form and instructions for completing it; you do not have legal guidance, and no statement on this page determines what any office will do with your submission. Direct those questions to not stated, to the personnel office that serves you, or to the office designated in not stated.
Questions and answers
- What is DD Form 553?
- DD Form 553, Deserter/Absentee Wanted by the Armed Forces, March 2015
- Which edition is current?
- Not stated by the publisher
- Who is responsible for this form?
- Not stated
- In which formats can it be downloaded?