Entitlement to Additional Per Diem

An advance decision was requested concerning whether an Army employee was entitled to payment of additional per diem, together with payment of taxi fares and costs of baggage handling in connection with an overnight stopover, incurred incident to renewal agreement travel. The Army disallowed the employee's claim on the basis of a constructive travel schedule that does not provide for any delay in the performance of onward travel from his overnight stopover. Thus, the issue presented in the employee's case was whether the constructive travel schedule used to determine his per diem entitlement should be based on an itinerary concerning reasonable hours of travel or whether that schedule should be modified to reflect the fact that the employee and his wife actually traveled aboard an air carrier that departed shortly before midnight. In the employee's case, the late night departure from his overnight stopover did not warrant the conclusion that it would have been reasonable to schedule his travel at that hour 2 days earlier for the purpose of establishing his entitlement to per diem on a constructive cost basis. Accordingly, the employee was entitled to the payment of additional per diem for himself and other allowable expenses incident to his overnight stop.