DOD Orders New Mileage Guide

The Department of Defense is replacing its old method of calculating mileage for transporters with a new computerized system that it says will provide distance information instantly while eliminating paperwork.

The new system, which is now available commercially, is expected to be less expensive and easier to use for trucking companies that do business with DOD, according to the department. DOD pays for most carrier services by the mile.

Next year, all motor carriers involved in military business will have to use the electronic system — the Defense Table of Official Distances — in preparing invoices for military shipments, including household goods and personal property. The mileage table will be supplied by ALK Associates, Princeton, N.J.

The table, known commercially as PC-Miler, will supplant the printed Household Goods Carrier’s Bureau Committee Mileage Guide and its electronic version, Rand McNally’s TDM MileMaker System. Currently, many carriers gear driver pay and fuel and mileage tax reporting to these and other mileage systems.

Those products “are going away as far as DOD is concerned,” said Sheila Parker, a department computer specialist. DOD has no plans to publish a paper guide, she said.

The new system came from efforts to create a single mileage standard for DOD-authorized shipments, according to Ethel Anderson, project manager for the Military Traffic Management Command. “We want to eliminate hard copy,” she said.

Transportation and finance offices must wade through 2,352 pages in four books to find out how much to pay a moving company or DOD traveler. These books haven’t been updated since 1982, Ms. Anderson said. DOD’s intent is to create a uniform standard to provide “consistent information,” she said.

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