[Appeal of Disallowance of Request for Waiver of Annual Leave]

An employee of the Social Security Administration appealed a Claims Group disallowance of her request for a waiver of hours of annual leave which were erroneously credited to her annual leave account. The agency improperly placed her in a higher leave earnings category by improperly including as creditable service the employee's prior service with a Department of Agriculture county office. Such service is not creditable service unless the employee is employed by the Department of Agriculture. In her appeal, the employee stated that she was adversely affected by the error which was solely the agency's fault, and the delay in discovering the error increased the degree by which an adjustment to correct the error would adversely affect her leave balance. GAO found that it was unfortunate that appropriate agency officials did not discover the error sooner. However, the agency's delay in discovering the error did not provide a basis for allowing a waiver of the excess annual leave. In this case, there was no overpayment which could be considered for waiver, since the error was susceptible to correction through a reduction of the employee's positive leave balance. Accordingly, the Claims Group action was sustained.