Board of Contract Appeals General Services Administration Washington, D.C. 20405 _________________ December 16, 1998 _________________ GSBCA 14562-TRAV In the Matter of RALPH J. MULDER Ralph J. Mulder, Cortland, OH, Claimant. Maj. Thomas J. Faulconer, Assistant Staff Judge Advocate, Hickam Air Force Base, HI, appearing for Department of the Air Force. NEILL, Board Judge. Claimant, Mr. Ralph Mulder, is a civilian employee working as a management analyst for the United States Air Force. He seeks to be reimbursed for return agreement travel, which was denied to him by the Air Force. The travel was denied once his local civilian personnel office (CPO) learned that Mr. Mulder had registered in the Department of Defense (DOD) Priority Placement Program and might not, therefore, complete his extended overseas tour. For the reasons set out below, we deny the claim. Background Mr. Mulder worked continuously at Yakota Air Base in Japan from October 1989 to November 1997. On May 29, 1996, he was notified that his overseas tour had been extended for an additional two years, namely, from October 31, 1996 through October 30, 1998. The notice advised Mr. Mulder that if, during the first year of that renewal, he wished to take renewal agreement travel, he could do so provided he met two conditions. The first was that he complete the minimum service requirement since his last renewal agreement travel. The second condition was that, after his return from the renewal agreement travel, there be at least twelve months of duty remaining on his recently extended tour. On April 21, 1997, a little less than a year later and in anticipation of finally taking his return agreement travel, Mr. Mulder signed a transportation agreement (DD Form 1617). The agreement provided that, until Mr. Mulder completed a twelve month prescribed tour of duty, he would not be eligible for return travel and transportation allowances at Government expense to his place of actual residence in the United States. The agreement also stated that Mr. Mulder would repay transportation costs paid on his behalf by the Government if he failed to remain in the Government's service for a minimum period of twelve months. Also on April 21, 1997, Mr. Mulder submitted a home leave request for renewal agreement travel. The request was approved by his supervisor on April 22. The following day, Mr. Mulder was issued travel orders authorizing renewal agreement travel to the United States with departure on or about June 13, 1997. On June 9, 1997, Mr. Mulder presented his travel orders at Yokota's Schedule Airline Ticket Office and requested a round- trip ticket for renewal agreement travel to his home in Indiana. He was told that the ticket could not be issued because the CPO was in the process of canceling his orders. Claimant tells us that the explanation he received from the CPO was that authorization for return agreement travel was withdrawn because he had recently decided to seek a hardship transfer to the United States and, therefore, would not be able to honor a condition of his travel agreement that he remain employed at Yakota Air Base for an additional twelve months. Mr. Mulder had, in fact, on June 1, 1997, submitted a formal request for a hardship transfer from Yakota, Japan, to the Indianapolis, Indiana area. The record contains an undated note to Mr. Mulder from his supervisor advising him that this transfer request disqualified him from renewal travel. According to the supervisor, Mr. Mulder, in requesting the transfer was, in effect, "declining" to remain for his extended tour. The supervisor, therefore, advised Mr. Mulder that renewal travel was not authorized but that home leave was approved with the understanding that it would be at Mr. Mulder's personal expense. Furthermore, the supervisor explained that time spent in traveling to and from the States would have to come out of Mr. Mulder's annual leave. On June 11, 1997, claimant's return agreement travel orders were revoked in their entirety. On June 13, 1997, Mr. Mulder left Japan for a home visit. He returned to Tokyo on July 10. Upon return, he submitted a claim for $1270.95 for the cost of his travel home and two days of travel-time per diem. In addition, he requested the restoration of sixteen hours of annual leave used to make his return trip home and then return to Japan. The claim was denied by the Air Force. On November 4, 1997, Mr. Mulder left Japan to return to the United States. Under DOD's Priority Placement Program he had secured a transfer to Youngstown Air Reserve Station in Ohio. He continues to work there today. By letter dated April 15, 1998, Mr. Mulder appealed the Air Force's denial of his claim to the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). His reason for doing so was apparently prompted by the fact that his claim includes a request for the restoration of leave, a matter falling within the jurisdiction of OPM and not this Board. OPM, however, subsequently transferred the matter to this Board, pointing out that the dispositive issue for both the return agreement travel claim and the claim for restoration of leave is the entitlement, if any, to return agreement travel - - a matter which the Board is authorized to decide pursuant to 31 U.S.C.  3702(a)(3) (Supp. II 1996). Discussion Claimant contends that, for an employee to be entitled to renewal agreement travel, three conditions must be met. The first condition is the satisfactory completion of the obligatory overseas employment contract; the second condition is the commander's approval of an extension of the employment for another two years; the third condition is that the employee must sign a renewal travel agreement to remain in Government employment for at least another twelve months. Because he satisfied these three conditions, Mr. Mulder believes he is entitled to renewal agreement travel. Mr. Mulder's description of the requirements to be satisfied in order to be eligible for renewal agreement travel lacks one essential ingredient. It is not enough that the employee agree to remain in Government service for twelve months. Statute requires that, before the employee departs from the post of duty where the prior tour was satisfactorily completed, he or she is to enter into a new written agreement for another specified period of service. See 5 U.S.C.  5728(a) (Supp. II 1996). As a civilian employee of DOD, claimant is subject to the department's Joint Travel Regulations (JTR). These regulations consider that the statutory requirement of an agreement to complete a new tour of duty at the overseas permanent duty station is met with the employee's execution of a transportation agreement. JTR C4001-A. Employees such as Mr. Mulder who are taking leave between consecutive tours of overseas duty are required to sign the transportation agreement set out in DD Form 1617. JTR C4012-C.3. Mr. Mulder reads the language of the transportation agreement in DD Form 1617 very narrowly. In his opinion, the agreement says nothing about his completing his extended period of service at Yakota Air Base but requires only that he remain in the service of the Government for twelve months. Claimant is correct that the transportation agreement he signed does not contain an express commitment to complete the new tour of duty. Nevertheless, if such a commitment is not at least implicit in the agreement, then the statutory requirement for an agreement to serve for another specified period, prior to departing on return agreement travel, has not been met. In the absence of such an agreement, no employee is entitled, under the law, to round trip travel between consecutive tours. Thus, in his own case, by reading this commitment out of the transportation agreement he signed, Mr. Mulder has, in effect, disqualified himself from receiving the return agreement travel benefit. On that ground alone, his claim must be denied. At the time Mr. Mulder took his leave in June 1997, the Air Force was not aware of his narrow interpretation of the transportation agreement he signed as a prerequisite for return agreement travel. Nevertheless, his superiors concluded that the implied commitment in the agreement, to complete the extended period of service, was withdrawn once Mr. Mulder sought to enter DOD's Priority Placement Program. His superiors, therefore, canceled their approval of his request for renewal agreement travel and the orders based on this approval. We find this action reasonable under the circumstances and in keeping with a JTR provision which provides that such travel may be denied when an employee is to be reassigned to a position in CONUS (Continental United States) in connection with rotation or similar programs which will preclude completion of a required period of service under a renewal agreement. JTR C4155-A.5. Another argument raised by the claimant is that he more than earned a free return trip home by working and living twenty-four hours a day with the military for eight stressful years in a foreign country. He states that during that extended period he received only one free trip home. It is not entirely clear to us why the claimant makes this argument. If the intent is to suggest we grant relief out of fundamental fairness notwithstanding failure to meet a specific requirement of statute and regulation, the argument fails. Such relief would be beyond our authority. On the other hand, if claimant is suggesting that renewal agreement travel was justified in June 1997 because it had been earned but not taken in the past, this too fails as an argument. The JTR clearly states: "Entitlement to renewal agreement travel is not cumulative from one period of service to another if not used." JTR C4157. In short, upon review of the evidence before us, we find the Air Force's refusal to look upon Mr. Mulder's trip to the United States in June 1997 as return agreement travel to be reasonable and in accordance with applicable statute and regulations. The claim is, therefore, denied. _____________________ EDWIN B. NEILL Board Judge