The DHS IG’s office has said that in four separate investigations, it largely confirmed allegations by whistleblowers of abuse of administratively uncontrollable overtime, or AUO, pay in Customs and Border Protection
The reports are the latest in a series of critical examinations of use of that pay at CBP, which accounts for the bulk of the government’s use of that pay, which is an add-on of up to 25 percent of a law enforcement officer’s salary for remaining at work when the requirements of the job demand it. The Office of Special Counsel and the GAO also have repeatedly questioned whether that pay is being abused and DHS itself earlier took steps to disqualify some of those who had been receiving it on a routine basis.
The IG audits were based on information forwarded by OSC from whistleblowers who had contacted that agency. They focused on a Border Patrol station, a training center, agency headquarters and several Border Patrol sectors—where AUO pay was going to agents who served as fitness instructors. In the other locations, it said, “many of the tasks border patrol agents performed during AUO hours appeared to have been administratively controllable.”
Late in 2014 legislation was enacted under which CBP officers will choose work schedules of 80, 90 or 100 hours biweekly, with prorated pay increases for the latter two, and end that AUO pay for them (they would get compensatory time off for time worked beyond their regular schedules).
About 29,000 DHS employees received AUO pay in 2013 with the average payment per employee about $17,000, GAO said recently.
