Air Force Overpaid $150,000 for Bathroom Soap Dispensers

Everyone appreciates a clean bathroom, but for this price tag, the Air Force better have the cleanest airplane bathrooms of all time.

A study looking at government spending uncovered that the Defense Department overpaid for soap dispensers. And it wasn’t by just a little bit; the department spent 7,943 percent more than the over-the-counter price. 

According to the report, Boeing, the maker of the C-17 aircraft, overcharged the Air Force for spare parts to make and repair the plane, including the soap dispensers for the bathrooms. The actual cost per dispenser is not known, as it was redacted in the report, but in total the Air Force was overcharged $149,072 dollars for the soap dispensers. 

Critics have pointed out that the over-the-counter soap dispensers, that looks almost exactly the same, are pretty cheap. Considering that the U.S. military has only 220 C-17’s, that means if every plane got a brand-new dispenser, it would work out to roughly $677 per dispenser.

Now the Defense Department is pushing back, stating that the over-the-counter dispenser does not meet the standards needed to be installed in an aircraft and that is part of the reason for the higher price tag. The Air Force did release a statement saying that they are evaluating how they deal with sub-contractors and will reevaluate their contracts.