What To Do When The Regional Office Violates Regulations?

[broncovet]

What can we Vets do when the Regional Office Fails to follow Regulations?

Example: The Cleveland Regional Office is supposed to consider all claims and evidence before rendering a decision. Moody vs Principii says it this way:

"the VA has a duty to “fully and sympathetically develop a veteran’s claim to its optimum,” 251 F.3d at 1384 (quoting Hodge v. West, 155 F.3d 1356, 1362 (Fed. Cir. 1998)), and that this requires the VA to “determine all potential claims raised by the evidence, applying all relevant laws and regulations.”

So, what do I do now that the Cleveland Regional Office "overlooked" my claim for more than 5 years, and refuses to acknowledge it?

I filed a NOD in 2004, and the Regional Office ignored my NOD and "interpreted it as a claim for benefits" instead.

What can we Vets do to force the Regional Office to obey its regulations? All my "Statements in support of claim" as well as 3 NOD's from 2004-2008 have simply been ignored.

Edited January 3, 2009 by broncovet

[gp747]

i wish i knew the answer to that too .regarding the cleveland office i have no

use for them what so ever as my claim somehow went through there. they

are as bad as my ro when it comes to denying claims as far as my experience

goes with them.

[Pete53]

Inspector General, Congress or complain to Sec Peake directly is all I have

[john999]

That is a case where I would haunt my congressman's office until I heard something. No way a claim should take that long. Something is wrong and I bet they lost your claim, or it went in the shredder. Do you have proof of when you filed it and what you filed with it?

[Capt.]

Hello Bronc,,,,, I would do what John and Pete have suggested. First do you have thee copies and the certified receipts of sending to your VARO any and all of your claims and NODS??? You certainly must do everything by registered and signature receipt on all documents they get from you. This will be the only way you can have your day in court and prove your case that you did file and have NODs too. It all boils down to you have to prove this . Not the VA, even though by law they must ...."assist" you. ) Also who is helping you as far a VSO? They should be holding the VA to respond. It would be wise to contact your Senator , Congressman and make sure your paperwork is well documented. If you prevail and win your claim/award , then retro entitlement could possibly be due back to EED. Earliest Effective Date. I would not sit on this or give up ...just press your dated evidence and move ahead making them respond to your letters and complaints but having someone help you such as VSO/Congressman/Senator offices will also try and keep some sanity to an already crazy situation. Please don't feel that the VA has singled you out because all of us here at Hadit have been or are still putting up with the same old stuff you are talking about. God Bless,C.C. NEVER GIVE UP

[broncovet]

I have copies of the NOD which was stamped received by the Cleveland Regional Office in a timely manner. Where I got the copy, is that I requested a complete copy of my C-file, and it was sent to me by the regional office, so there is no dispute as to whether or not they received it.

I got upset and filed a Writ of Mandamus 4 years later, largely due to inaction on the NOD. In their response to the Writ, the Cleveland Regional Office claimed that my NOD was "interpreted as a claim for benefits" and therefore not valid. However, this is actually false because there was never any benefits awarded or denied on that date. However, my appeal has been effectively terminated as they steadfastly refuse to take any action on in, in spite of my protests.

It looks like the Regional Office can interpret regulations in any manner they see fit, and I can not do anything about it.

If they can just say that the Veterans NOD was interpreted as something else, they can (and have) simply ignored the Veterans NOD. It is like the wolf guarding the chicken house, and giving any count they want on the chickens.

Edited January 4, 2009 by broncovet

[rentalguy1]

Please post the exact wording of your NOD that was submitted to/received by the RO, if possible. I don't want to slam a RO without knowing what was sent to them.