Request for Overtime Compensation for Travel

Employees of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) requested reconsideration of the GAO Claims Group denial of their claim for overtime compensation for time spent in a travel status. The claimants were required to travel to a Government hearing on very short notice. When the hearing ended, the claimants returned to their regular place of duty. The return trip took 6 hours, and this is the overtime claimed that was denied by the Claims Group. The proper resolution of this case depended on two distinct legal concepts: (1) the 2-day per diem rule, and (2) the employees' entitlement to overtime compensation or compensatory time for time spent traveling. Regulations require that: (1) the travel must result from an event which could not be scheduled or controlled administratively, and (2) an immediate official necessity must be present which required the travel to be performed outside the employees' regular duty hours. Since this was not the case, the request for overtime compensation cannot be granted. Further, the 2-day per diem rule merely governs payment of per diem when an employee delays travel in order to travel during regularly scheduled working hours. Since the day immediately following the hearing was a holiday, it was not a regularly scheduled working day, and the employees felt that this entitled them to overtime pay. Compliance with the 2-day per diem rule will not result in payment of overtime compensation. Accordingly, the disallowance of the claim by the Claims Group was affirmed.