Liability for Overpayments Concerning Nontemporary Storage Fees

The Department of Justice requested a determination as to whether an employee is liable for overpayments that the agency made for storage of his household goods. The employee in question was transferred overseas for a 4-year period in 1971. In connection with his transfer, some of the employee's household goods were placed in nontemporary storage at Government expense until his return in 1975. In July 1979, Justice discovered that it had paid excess storage costs beginning in 1976. The employee does not believe that he should be held liable for the excess storage costs because he claims that he wrote the storage company asking them to dispose of his property. However, he did not notify his agency of his request, and the storage company indicated that it never received his request. Justice wanted to know whether the employee or the storage company was liable for the excess payments. Justice also wanted to know whether the statute of limitations would have an effect on the collection of said payments. GAO held that, although the employee was not being paid the money directly, he knew that the Government was paying the storage company. It was at least partially due to his failure to keep his agency advised that his goods remained in storage and that the charges continued to be paid on his behalf by the Government. Since no evidence has been presented to show that the storage company knew or should have known of the unauthorized period of storage, it appeared to have rendered its services in good faith and there is no basis to collect the unauthorized payments from the company. GAO concluded that: (1) the employee was liable for the overpayments and they should be collected from him, and (2) the earliest that an action for recovery of erroneous payments would be barred would be sometime after January 1, 1982. However, since the employee is still with the agency, the 6-year statute of limitations is not applicable in this case.