Va Claim Backlog Update 06

[free_spirit_etc]

http://www.geocities.com/vfw9951/docs/AFNEWS.html

VA CLAIM BACKLOG UPDATE 06: The worst city in which to file a veterans’ benefits claim is Washington, where 63% of claims take longer than six months to resolve, according to a major veterans’ service organization. AMVETS, a 60-year-old group that helps veterans with about 24,000 claims a year, says a survey has shown veterans in Fargo, N.D.; Boise, Idaho; and Providence, R.I., have the fastest service, with only 6 to 7% of claims taking longer than six months to resolve. Washington may be the worst, but other major cities also are slow. AMVETS national service officer and Navy veteran Luz Rebollar said in Chicago, Detroit, Pittsburgh, New Orleans and Montgomery AL about 40% of the claims take longer than six months to process. One reason for the differences is that the number of people assigned to process claims in some VA regions does not match the claims caseloads in those areas. For example, VA workers in Hartford CT handle 92 cases a year, while workers in Augusta ME handle 57 cases a year.

The Bush administration has proposed hiring 450 additional claims processors to try to reduce the backlog, but AMVETS officials have warned that more people will not solve the problem and, unless the caseloads are more evenly spread, will not eliminate delays for some people. AMVETS is pushing the idea of allowing electronic claims filing and other efforts to use technology to help process claims. “The backlog issue is not going to go away until the federal government rolls up its sleeves and takes a serious look at expediting the resolution of claims,” Rebollar said. “Until that happens, young veterans just returning from service in Iraq and Afghanistan are going to continue to be frustrated with our government and with a system they believe is failing to fulfill the promises that were made to them when they entered the service.” To review the delay time in your city refer to www.navytimes.com/projects/pages/042007vastats. [source: NavyTimes Rick Maze article 20 Apr 07 ++]

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That kind of surprises me --NOT the backlog - but the case load. I actually thought the VA case loads would be much higher than that.

Free

[SLEDGE]

They are using the wrong standard to evaluate who does what.

If they did it right the first time 80% of their workload would disappear within 5 years.

Quotas are self defeating.

sledge

[Vike17]

The article wasn't talking about appeals.

If veterans would stop submitting tenious or fraudulant claims, or claims that are incoplete as far as evidence to where VA has to go on hunting expidetions to find stuff on the their behalf, the claims backlog would come down quite a bit. But that this doesn't make for good press so it isn't something you're going to hear about.

Vike 17

Edited May 14, 2007 by Vike17

[allan]

>claims that are incomplete as far as evidence to where VA has to go on hunting expeditions to find stuff on the their behalf.

Hello Vike,

It has to be very discouraging to work as hard as you do, at trying to make sure a claim is processed fairly.

I would think you would also be getting allot of claims from brain injured troops. Don't expect these vets to excel in organizational skills or have a clue what evidence is needed to succeed or where to get it.

You are talking about 19-25 yr olds, that are punch drunk from multiple brain trauma's & environmental exposures, right?

How widespread the "fraud" is on the part of "veterans", I really have know knowledge.

I do know, that vets who need it the most, may suffer out of "rumors" of wide spread fraudulent claims being filed.

I also know, that if a large number of TBI vets are not granted duty to assist in putting the claim together properly from the begining, that many of our military families with children, may suffer.

[jbasser]

I think this is an interesting topic. I agree with Vike that the RO's are doing a pretty good Job overall. Now a RO with 15 years of service has to take a day off every 2 weeks. They are allowed to carry over 240 hours of vacation but cannot exceed 240 unless approved by upper management. That is 26 days of vacation per year not to mention 13 days of sick leave per year. It is not too kosher to use too much sick leave. It adds to overall retirement time.

There should be an initial investigation team to screen claims when they hit the door. There should be 2 development teams. One for claims that have the documentation that substantiates the claim and should be pressed on fairly quickly, while ones that are claims that have no documentation should be developed by a different group.

That would free up the system a little. I dont think it occurs because the RO.s I have talked to, do all claims by the month they were received. That sounds fair but it also boggs down the system.

John

Edited May 14, 2007 by jbasser

[Berta]

Are these figures from the BVA Chairman's report of 2006?

Or the OIG report of 2005?

I mentioned that I was asking my Congressman to sponsor a bill but I am instead asking Senator Schumer to sponsor it-

to amend the VCAA-

It is just extraordinary to me to see the documentation of violation of this Ultimate DTA reg-continuing to cause so much of the backlog problem.

The BVA and the CAVC knows it, DAV and AL, and VVA knows it, we know it and the VAROs know it-and we pay for a Committee in Washington to deal with it-

yet it still occurs.

It takes mere minutes to send a vet a generic VCAA letter-

It takes reading the claim and the evidence however, to prepare the legal VCAA letter and to include the election notice-

Two years ago my RO said they were working on Saturdays to get out VCAA letters- I still haven't got one.

If the VARO sends an illegal VCAA letter or fails to send the election notice, they have committed a prejudicial error-right from the start.

I feel the bill should amend the VCAA by stating, upon receipt of a deficient or generic VCAA letter with/or without election notice, the claimant, and/or their representative can file a statement that prejudicial error has occurred to the claimants detriment and that a proper VCAA letter should be forthcoming.

These reps have some blame here- how many claimants really know what a legal VCAA letter is-

my former rep knew I didnt get a legal one- and it took me time to find out I didnt.

"In Overton v. Nicholson, the court determined that adequate notification had not been given to the claimant. Nonetheless, it held it was required to determine whether that prejudiced the claimant. Relying on the prejudicial error test announced in the first Mayfield decision, the court held that the appellant must show how lack of proper notification equated to being denied a meaningful opportunity to participate in the claims process. Once this is shown, the burden shifts to the VA secretary to show that the appellant did have a meaningful opportunity to participate. The court continued that, in its review of such a claim, it was then required to review the entire record, not just the VCAA notifications."

from:http://www.pva.org/site/PageServer?pagename=rights_gc

If the VA does not specifically tell you what evidence is needed to support your claim-

in a highlighted section of the VCAA letter- they have prejudiced your ability to

succeed.

The BVA web site supports what I mean.

[Vike17]

Jbasser,

When you stated;

"There should be an initial investigation team to screen claims when they hit the door. There should be 2 development teams. One for claims that have the documentation that substantiates the claim and should be pressed on fairly quickly, while ones that are claims that have no documentation should be developed by a different group"

this is what the VA basically was doing before the VCAA in 2000. When one thinks about it, before the VCAA of 2000 came into the picture, VA required a claim to be "well grounded" before they would take further action to "assist' the veteran in obtaining any other evidence for a claim and ultimately develope the claim for a rating decision. If the claim wasn't well grounded the VA had the authority to deny it on that basis without any further development.

Now, don't get me wrong, I think the VCAA of 2000 is to a certain extent a good thing. But to a large extent, it has caused a portion of the backlog. For example, a veteran submits a claim for a certain condition and has submitted all the needed evidence to support it. i.e. contunity of treatment since discharge, IMO's, ect..., the VA is still required by law to send that veteran a DTA letter with the VCAA response and give the veteran at least 60 days to submit anything additional. The veteran receives this redundant letter and gets all pissed because he just sent everything to them already. So, what happens next, the veteran thinks the VA has somehow lost his stuff and he resubmits everything again! This in return causes VA to get flooded with duplicate records and then they have to send the duplicates back to the veteran with yet another letter explaining that the records he recently submitted are already in his C-file ect... All this time 30-90 days has elapsed trying to sort this mess out that could have been used to do other needed development such as scheduling a C&P ect... This is just one of a possible senarios that can happen!

The mess wasn't actually created by the RO, they are required by law to send that damned DTA letter regardless of the circumstances, because, if God forbid, the veteran appealed the decision and that DTA letter isn't of records, the BVA would remand the claim back to the RO. A never and circle jerk because of the CAVA.

If everyone thinks there's a backlog now, wait until lawyers get envolved. They'll start sending in letters and motions with there boilerplate letters just adding to the confusion with the hope of VA forgetting to dot an 'i" or cross a "t," which will somewhere down the line cause a dely or a remand. But that is what the lawyers actually want; to drag out the claims as long as possible to collect on a nice fee. And through out all of this the veteran is screaming for someone's head because of the ungodly delys!

Sometimes the veteran community should really watch out, because they actually might get what they ask for.

Vike 17