More than 250,000 federal employees nationwide are participating in a three-year voluntary experiment to find out if the federal government can successfully use flexible and compressed work schedules as alternatives to the traditional eight-hour day, forty-hour workweek. If the experiment is a success, the Congress may modify laws to allow permanent use of alternative work schedules. Because the results of the experiment may significantly affect the work habits and patterns of all federal employees, it is essential that the Congress have valid and reliable information on which to base its decision. The General Accounting Office (GAO) believes that the experiment and evaluation, which the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) is currently conducting, will not yield the data the Congress needs. As a result, the experiment will fail to achieve its intended objectives. GAO makes a number of recommendations to OPM and the Congress to increase the likelihood that the experiment and evaluation will produce the results needed. (Author)