SAVE Award 2011 Ideas

Simply stop minting the penny. It wouldn't be missed and the government would save vast amounts in acquisition, labor, distribution, and mgt costs.

Pay the winner of the SAVE Award contest a percentage of the savings that their idea generates in improving the quality of government output at lower costs or efficiency.

This financial incentive would launch the potentiality and the dynamic energy of the brain power of more than 2-million federal employees located around the world.

What should be the amount of the financial incentive for an individual winner or group... more »

Prior to working for the federal government, I spent approximately five (5) years employed in the private sector. A growing practice was the implementation of faxmail. The idea is simple: an individual is assigned a phone number, and when he/she receives a fax, it goes directly into his/her email inbox.

With the goal of creating a paperless work environment, the receipt of an electronic fax will create an instant savings... more »

Each department would be responsible for implementing an electronic “suggestion box” for their employees.

 

If employees can see and submit ideas online at their department web site throughout the year it would result in two positive developments: employees would contribute their ideas more often, and management of that department would less likely dismiss the suggestions of their employees.

Go the E-book way.

 

Than having the same hard bound reference book in every office, go electronic. Subscribe/pay for the group access and distribute the log-in info to all employees. The 'Physicians Desk Reference' and the Dictionaries comes to mind! How about Kindling it?

1. Paper waist 2.6 million pieces a year

I work for the Bureau of Prisons and we currently have 217,000 inmates all of which are required to work a job. Every month we calculate pay on the computer for the inmates and every month we print pay sheets. So that is 217,000 pieces of paper every month, 2,604,000 pieces of paper every year and the number is growing. Which is just a waist of paper not including the ink... more »

Currently federal agencies mandate electronic payroll deposits. On the flip side, many still send out paper payroll subs.

 

I would like to see a federal mandate to make all payroll stubs electronic. This would save postage and paper costs while simultanelously expediting these notices to all federal employees.

As there is this big push to get out of regulating business. Let's get rid of the Patent & Trademark Office. If business is so good at self regualting and policing, let them handle these issues themselves as well! This is not something the government should be involved in.

I suggest sending a copy of the Medicare/Medicaid bill to each recipient, either monthly or per incident. The benefits are in three areas:

- greater support for the program because recipients would be aware of their benefits

- cost containment: recipients are more likely to manage costs, avoid unnecessary and costly procedures and react to overcharges and outright fraud if they are aware of the ongoing expenses

- fraud... more »

Reference DODI 4715.5 and DODI 4715.03: Overseas US Installations

Overseas military installations usually subcontract out to local engineers for repairs to anything and everything on the installation. In doing this the local company / agency will charge an exorbitant amount of money to come and in and take days if weeks to fix nothing. I have had to escort these workers around and have personally seen a great portion... more »

When represenatives of claimants (at the hearing level) submit medical evidence within seven days of the hearing, those medical records must be sent to contracted medical experts scheduled to testify at the hearing by FedEx. The cost of the delivery of those last minute additions to the record to the Medical or Vocational Expert is absorbed by the Agency and also places unwarrented workload strains on an already tight... more »

It appears that HUD uses the EEOC motion/hearing process to provide training to their new Office of General Council attorneys. According to the last EEO office studies the Agency spends $194,000K+ per case by the time it gets to the EEOC hearing stage. The EEOC must have costs incurred by the time judges are involved too. Many, if not most, cases that I have been involved with as a union official could have been settled... more »

Increase flexibility to utilize NASA research facilities and labs for non-aerospace commercial entities and foreign allies.

Federal employees should have the ability to convert unused sick leave accrual to annual leave. Employees should be mandated to carry a minimum balance of unused sick leave before they would be able to convert furture hours into annual leave. For instance: an employee must have 240 hours of accrued sick leave in order to convert future hours. Conversion could be a two hour or three hour of sick leave for one hour... more »

Currently, the budgets to procure military equipment and the budgets to operate and sustain them are separated and managed by different parts of the organizations. As a result, during acquisition, decisions that could lower the long term cost of operating weapons systems are often put at a much lower priority than those affecting immediate schedule or performance. If the same manager controlled both budgets, then rational... more »