Request for Reimbursement of Transoceanic Travel on a Foreign-Flag Air Carrier

A Navy officer was transferred from Pensacola, Florida, to the Philippines. He was directed to use Government air transportation for the transoceanic travel, and was authorized circuitous travel with a layover in Hawaii for his personal convenience. En route to California, he learned that the circuitous travel via Hawaii would require an 8-day delay, rather than a 3-day delay in Hawaii as requested. By this time, the direct Government air transportation was no longer available. He therefore purchased tickets on a foreign-flag air carrier and justified this travel by executing a justification certificate stating that the American-flag carrier would not have been available because it was booked up for a period of 5 days. According to the regulations, a service member may execute a justification certificate regarding unavailability of United States-flag air carriers if the traveler, en route, has to wait 6 hours or more to transfer to a United States-flag air carrier when proceeding to a destination. However, the regulation does not apply: (1) to a service member waiting to begin travel but not "en route" from origin airport to destination, or (2) if only military reduced-rate seats are unavailable but other seats are available. Merely being in a travel status is not sufficient to satisfy the "en route" requirement of the regulation. This provision was intended primarily to avoid having passengers wait more than 6 hours at an airport in order to catch a connecting flight. In addition, the officer did not show that commercial passenger service was unavailable. In confining his search to military rate seats, the service member apparently was attempting to minimize his cost and consequent Government reimbursement. The purpose of the regulation, however, is not concerned with minimizing the cost of air transportation, but with utilizing United States-flag air carriers for air transportation in order to produce revenue for the carriers regardless of costs. Since the service member chose to travel by a foreign-flag carrier when there was available to him the higher cost commercial passenger service of a United States-flag air carrier, he may not be reimbursed.