Hardship Letter Letter Slowed Process?

[88 mike]

I called the 1 800# today and was told that they (authorization) are reviewing my hardship letter and that my claim will be done soon. When I visited the RO my claim already had been decided. The case worker I saw had me submit the letter due to overdue bills. Do you guys think that letter slowed things down or did it help?

[onlyluvchi]

I just helped a veteran who was claiming hardship. The veteran was told to file the hardship forms in conjuction with a TDIU application. According to his service officer the VA puts a color coded tag on the outside of the file indicating expeditied processing due to hardship. In this case the veteran was recently service connected at 50% and it had been documented by clinicians for the previous ten years that he was homeless living in a van with his dog. Things went really quick as far as I am concerned. I was told they are supposed to process these claims in 90 days.. The ninety days went by and his service officer told us she was going to talk to the "rating coach". Two days later the veteran got a call from the service officer telling him his TDIU was awarded and he would have a retro check within 5 days. The retro check was in his bank account three days later.

The RO had really botched this claim. They got bogus medical reports which made me get IMO's that made the VA doctors look like idiots. The reports I got were cited as the basis for service connection in an earlier decision. It would have been embarasing if a veteran had been homless for ten years for a condition he should have been service connected at 30% in 1977 continued to get the run around. I told the SO to let the DRO know that I was still helping this veteran and that I got the IMO's chastizing the military and the VA for not treating the veteran 30 years ago and I would go public.with local news if they did not do something quick. It could have been a combination of the application for expediting the claim and the potential for embarrasment that resulted in his getting his retro so fast. Maybe threats work. I am not sure.

Well can you help me, I not only sent a hardship letter, it was sent to Senator Sherrod Brown and I still have yet to hear anything more about it and that was Dec 2010. You can reach me by email onlyluvchi@yahoo.com

[broncovet]

Threats may work, but they may also backfire.

Rather than threats, you might try punching them in the "media". . While its hard to get the media to look at this, you can try a carefully prepared, well thought out comment on the VA blog website. (Vantage Point)

Sample VA media comment: (Use your own words and circumstances..and never lie)

Dear .....

I am a Veteran in trouble and I dont know where else to get help. I am 50% disabled, but we just can not live on that 770 per month, and I am in danger of being evicted from my home. I have applied for an increase in disability, along with a hardship letter, but nothing I have been able to do so far has worked. I dont want to become another homeless Vet, and the best thing for me would seem to get my approval promptly as I feel certain I qualify for the increase. My VSO has been no help, nor has my Senator been able to speed anything up. I am desperate, what do I do?

signed "Soon to be homeless Vet"

Edited January 21, 2011 by broncovet

[Pete53]

For some reason homeless rings more bells at VA than hardship.

[Veldrina]

To Chuck: I must disagree with you regarding "who benefits". Neither VA management nor any employee gets anyof the $ that goes towards veterans. We are paid through a different system that most federal employees, be the VA or another agency, get paid through. The $ for veterans is its own entity, like the $ for SSA. As for the ever-increasing workforce...where? We have had a hiring freeze for a very long time. Obama was able to lift that and allowed u sto finally hire a bunch of people, but many of these are trainees right now. It takes a few years to really understand what you're doing as a developer, and MANY years to be a competent rater. So even though we have increased the size of our workforce recently, many of these people won't be ready to help with the huge backlog for some time. Add the never-ending policies and laws that Congress keeps throwing our way, such as the new Nehmer ruling, and you have a pile-up. As for bonuses, we don't get any. Federal employees make 1/3 what people who work in corporate do. And Obama has now frozen our our pay for 2 years, meaning no cost of living increase for us even though our health insurance & other things went up. We're feeling it along with you.

Regarding hardship cases, it IS one of our priority cases, along with homeless and Congressionals, Nehmer cases, GWOT cases, etc. With some many "priority" cases, it's sometimes hard to figure out what to do first, and it changes from week to week. One thing Chuck said though, regarding simple claims. Yes, many times a claim of 4 or less issues can be done more quickly than someone claiming 14 things, simply because of the amount of research, exams, development etc that goes into it. However, if a case is over a year or a priority claim, it gets done first, regardless of number of issues.