Originally posted by CG:
There is actually method to their madness. The government makes large contracts with the airlines for city-pair rates. These rates are privately negotiated and have no relation to the published rates you may find. The rates are the same every day of the year, are fully changeable and refundable, and can be used only by govt employees under orders. The object of the government is to get the best overall cost from the airlines for their entire travel budget, i.e. we have to move 900,000 people around the U.S. this year, what is the total cost going to be. In order to acomplish this, they contract with the airlines who bid with the understanding that all official travel will be done using these rates. The end result is that some city pairs have very low rates (for example any rate to Pensacola, FL which is a training command with a lot of transient personnel), and other cities have very high rates. Even though the government may pay more then the currently published fare (although this usually isn't the case if you look at a compareable fully refundable ticket) for a given ticket, they more then make up for it by paying much less then any published fare to those cities that receive the most government travelers. Why don't they cheat and use the published fares when they are lower? If they did, the airlines would cancel their contracts and not give them the good deals on the most traveled routes, thus increasing the total cost to the govt for travel. I know you like to think of all government employees as being idiots, but there are a few of us that are spending your taxpayer dollars wisely even if you don't know it.
WRONG!
I must vigorously disagree. Let's pretend that the government has no business being in the travel business. Regardless of the caliber of people, or the goodness of their intentions, the government will never provide the taxpayer the best value for their tax dollars when scheduling/purchasing commercial travel.
My experience with SATO, and other travel agencies on base, is that they are ill-informed, and ill-equipped to do their job.
The cost of supporting the infrastructure is absurd. The government needs to accept the fact that I can be trusted to find the best fare when I travel and that we live in a point-and-click world. The idea of even picking up a phone and calling a government agency is a waste of my time. Then, faxing your orders, and walking over to pick up tickets because they claim you can't ticket electronically, even though the same agency booked electronic tickets for the same route, on the same airline, 30 days prior.
Then there is the travel accounting nightmare and the accompanying infrastructure to support that. The paperwork blizzard required to get reimbursed is just nuts.
I have consistently demonstrated that I can beat government rates, if I can book 30 days in advance. This is usually possible. No quadruple copies of orders, no telephone time, no faxes, no time on hold. Just point, click, pay, print the itinerary and confirmation number.
Just for reference, I fly with the Air Force Reserve. I came on active duty in 1976. The Air Force puts bombs on target. That is their mission; they are good at it. Just as you would not call your travel agent to bomb an Iraqi radar site, why would you call the Air Force (or any other branch of the service or government) to make travel arrangements?
Puh-lease!
[This message has been edited by FlyAAway (edited 02-21-2001).]