SAVE Award 2011 Ideas

If hotel room actual expense is cheaper to book outside the government rate, incorporate that into the DTS options when creating an authorization. Often times the per diem rate is higher than the cheapest rate offered.

There is currently no incentive for an employee to stay at less expensive hotels. I propose that if an employee books a hotel that is less than the maximum allowable per diem, then the employee and the government share the savings. For example, if maximum Per Diem for San Diego is $150 a night, and the employee books a $60/night hotel, the employee is paid half of the difference ($45), and the government saves $45.

Encourage employees to choose the lowest hotel rate below the Per Diem by giving them 10% of the amount below the Per Diem. Example, if the Per Diem is $200 and the final hotel bill is $100, the traveler would receive 10% of the amount below the Per Diem - $10.

There is an average amount (or more appropriately, percentage of the maximum) employees spend on travel expenses. This amount is almost certainly extremely close to the maximum allowed (or 100%), and certainly not the minimum possible. Employees should be compensated for spending less than this average amount, for instance, 50% of the savings. As an example, if I spend $60/night at a hotel instead of the average $90/night... more »

There is very little need for GSA exclusive contracts with airline companies that charge the government extraordinary amount for the same flight. Government workers can book their own flights online for hundreds, even thousands less. For example, flights from DAY to DCA are about $1300 while it can be found on Kayak or Expedia for less than $300.
Most travel are not cancelled, cancellation fees should be deductible... more »

A freind of mine was going to Virginia for training the V.A. paid $1300.00 for their ticket. I bought tickets on the same flight for 250.00. There were about 15 other employees from our V.A. that made the same trip. If you consider all of the traning or seminars that the different agencys may attend. I'm sure the amount of money that is wasted on travel is huge. It only takes a little time to find cheap flights online.... more »

There will always be a need for meetings but do all of them have to be face-to-face? No. With our technological advances and with GSA's current migration to the "cloud," we can communicate via our laptops or VTC. We need to utilize these "costly" technological investments.