Mileage Between Home and Common Carrier Terminal

An advance decision was requested on the issue of whether an employee should have been reimbursed for mileage to and from the place of family domicile when returning or departing from temporary duty, where the family resides 300 miles away from the employee's permanent duty station and the employee subsequently occupies bachelor quarters at the installation site. The claimant is a civilian employee of the Department of the Army. He terminated his lease for family housing at his permanent duty station while on leave status and moved his family 300 miles away to Cannonville, Utah. He remained on leave when he proceeded from Cannonville to Salt Lake City International Airport (SLCIA) in compliance with temporary duty orders. The claimant returned from his temporary duty station, proceeded directly to Cannonville from SLCIA. After returning to work at his permanent duty station, the claimant obtained a bachelor dormitory room which he continued to maintain. The employee claimed round-trip mileage of 530 miles for travel between his family's residence in Cannonville and SLCIA. Based on the determination that the claimant did not regularly commute from Cannonville, his reimbursement was limited to round-trip mileage of 140 miles in each instance based on the distances between his permanent duty station and SLCIA. His reclaim voucher was for mileage for the difference of 390 miles for round-trip travel between Cannonville and SLCIA. GAO held that the claimant could not be reimbursed mileage for round-trip travel between his family's new residence and the airport based on the fact that the claimant never commuted to his duty station from Cannonville. Under these circumstances, the claimant's residence for the purpose of computing mileage reimbursement was properly determined to be his permanent duty station rather than Cannonville, Utah. Accordingly, the employee's claim for additional mileage was denied.