PRESS ASSOCIATION -- Government departments spent more than £120 million on hotels in two years, with the Ministry of Defence alone racking up a £98 million bill, official figures show.
MoD staff stayed 396,076 nights in UK hotels at a cost of £65 million and 127,700 nights overseas at a cost of £33 million between 2008 and 2010.
This is the equivalent of £258 per night for accommodation abroad and £164 per night in Britain.
The MoD has recently come under fire over the cost of hotels for RAF personnel stationed in Italy as part of the Nato operation against Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's regime in Libya.
Seven other Whitehall ministries responded to Freedom of Information requests by data analysts Tableau Software.
The Department of Transport revealed that it spent £6.1 million on hotels, including nearly £9,000 on five-star accommodation, over the two-year period.
Other big-spending departments included the Ministry of Justice (£11.2 million) and the Department of Health (£3.5 million).
The responses reveal wide variations in departments' allowances, with the Treasury paying a room rate of up to £140 for hotels in London while the Department for Culture, Media and Sport limits the cost to £80.
The Foreign and Commonwealth Office said it could not provide any data because the information was not held centrally.
Bruno Saint-Cast, Tableau Software's vice president for Europe, said: "In this day and age situations like these shouldn't happen. The Government should have the ability to analyse data across all departments to identify exactly where savings can be made."