Agencies report that GSA policies aimed at achieving savings in their travel costs are producing results but the amount is difficult to quantify, GAO has said.
In examining the six agencies with the highest travel spending– Agriculture, Defense, Homeland Security, Justice, State, and VA—GAO found that they generally pursued cost-saving efforts consistent with GSA’s revisions to the Federal Travel Regulation and in travel bulletins.
It said GSA issued a total of 27 such cost-saving policies over 2011-2015 and that in some cases the agencies examined already had similar policies in place. In other cases, the agencies either developed new travel policies or issued guidance that reinforced the provisions or updated existing policies related to the provisions; or advised employees to follow the FTR without implementing an agency-specific policy.
“However, most of these savings could not be quantified,” GAO said, since savings on travel costs often are captured through broader efficiency efforts. Further, there are no standard practices across government to report on such savings, making it difficult to aggregate and compare data.
It said that although the Senior Travel Official Council, formed in 2015, “has taken some initial action to bring agencies together, additional efforts to facilitate agencies’ information sharing and identification of promising practices could further enhance these efforts to encourage and achieve travel cost-saving across the federal government.”