The reason DA Form 5888 looks the way it does is that a file has to speak for itself. Officially FAMILY MEMBER DEPLOYMENT SCREENING SHEET, it serves to family member deployment screening sheet, and the record it produces outlasts the people and the circumstances behind it. Edition 02/01/2026, status ACTIVE, is the version published here: 1 page(s), close to 200 fields, each one present because some later reader will need that fact without being able to ask for it. Because a subsequent edition has appeared, this copy stays available — a record made under one edition is interpreted under that edition.
Behind any Army form sit two separate decisions. What the document asks is settled by TSG, which maintains and revises it. Whether you raise it, and where it goes once signed, is settled by AR 608-75. That division is the reason a form can outlive several changes in the process it serves.
Retrieval governs the order of entry. The head of the form takes name, identification number, unit and date, and those values become the handles by which the record is found later — the substantive blocks are never searched on. This is why the spelling must match official records exactly rather than approximately.
The rules of entry all trace back to the page being fixed in advance. Tabbing follows the order built into the form, which usually matches how the page reads and misses less than clicking. An exclusive group discards the earlier selection because contradictory entries would make the record unusable. One-line fields have no wrap because print positions are predetermined, so an overlong entry displays fully and prints truncated. Longer text goes to the remarks area or a continuation, both provided for exactly that. Where nothing applies, the nil mark is entered — a blank leaves the reader unable to tell a considered answer from a skipped one.
Signing is the act that makes the document evidence, and until it happens the entries are only a proposal. Additional signatures — reviewer, approver, witness — each stand for a separate judgement, dated when applied so the record shows who accepted what and in what order. The common faults all damage that record in the same way: a blank mandatory field breaks the chain of required answers, swapped digits in an identification number detach the document from its subject, an inverted day and month misplaces it in time, and stale data from a reused copy states things nobody meant to state.
Behind the Privacy Act statement is a requirement that anyone asked for personal data be told, in advance, under what authority it is sought, for what purpose, who else routinely sees it, and whether refusal is possible. Reading it after completing the fields defeats its function. And the completed form is itself a personal record from that point on, subject to the handling rules such records carry.
Download the form
The published formats — PDF, XFDL — reflect the range of places a form gets filled in. Where there is a computer, the fillable pdf supplies live fields that keep entries positioned and readable. Where there is not, the printable pdf gives the identical page as flat artwork for pen entry. The distinction is one of setting rather than of authority; the page is the same document in both.
The choice of application decides whether your work survives. Browsers render pdfs as documents to be read; where a viewer shows fields without a mechanism to store them, typed text disappears when the tab closes, and nothing announces the loss. A full reader treats the file as a form and preserves entries on save. The xfdl format comes from IBM Lotus Forms, used across Army systems because of the routing and signature functions built into it, and it opens in the Lotus Forms Viewer alone.
There is no charge and no sign-up. Published documents are distributed as published, without modification.
What the form asks for
- ADDRESS
- COMMERC
- CONSIDER_A
- CONSIDER_B
- CONSIDER_C
- CONSIDER_D
- CONSIDER_E
- CONSIDER_F
- ContentArea1
- DATE
- DATE2
- DATE3
- DATESENT_A
- DATESENT_B
- DATESENT_C
- DATESENT_D
- DATESENT_E
- DATESENT_F
- DOB
- DOB_1
- DOB_2
- DOB_3
- DOB_4
- DOB_5
Disposition is prescribed, not chosen. AR 608-75 names the destination, whether that is a specific office, the unit administrative channel or the personal record, and the applicable records schedule governs how long it survives there. Both rules exist to keep the file consistent across offices with different habits. Take your copy before the document leaves, since it will not come back.
Series and number are how the DA series signals which documents belong together, and the grouping follows real process boundaries: a shared proponent or directive usually means a shared purpose. A form cited on the face of another is part of that same transaction, and continuation sheets, covers and transmittals complete it.
Revision follows the process, which is why editions appear without a fixed interval, and the printed date rather than any version number identifies them. Nothing on a stored copy signals that it has aged; the check is manual. Work already completed under a superseded edition stands as filed, because the record was made under those terms and is properly interpreted under them.
A word on where this page sits. These are reproductions of published Department of the Army documents, made available by an independent site with no official role and no authority to issue forms. The structure described above — proponent, prescribing directive, records schedule — exists apart from this site entirely, which is why nothing written here is legal advice and why acceptance by any office is not something that can be promised. Put questions of entry, requirement or eligibility to TSG or to the administrative office servicing your unit.
Questions and answers
- What is DA Form 5888?
- FAMILY MEMBER DEPLOYMENT SCREENING SHEET
- Which edition is current?
- 02/01/2026
- Who is responsible for this form?
- TSG
- In which formats can it be downloaded?
- PDF, XFDL, PDF