Dav Comments On Expedited Claim

[green]

I went to talk to the local DAV rep yesterday as I wanted to know how best to address the award date errors in the VA electronic systems. I explained to him that after calling the DAV 5 times and never receiving a call back I decided to pursue an expedited claim myself and submit it through Ebenefits. This guy told me a few things I wanted to run past the community to find out if they are true or BS.

• First he told me that I shouldn't have used Ebenefits but should have rather brought the claim to him so that he could put it in a DAV envelope and sent it to the Regional Office via courier.
• He said that anything the DAV submits is considered an expedited claim and will go through the system as fast as a veteran using Ebenefits.
• He said that as the DAV is checked as my service organization the first thing the Regional Office will do is send my claim file to the DAV for review which they will do and then send it back to the Regional Office (he said this will take extra time and slow down the process and that had I brought my file to them first the time delay would not be an issue).

Is any of this true?

Thank you,

Green

[zeelarry]

I've saw how this was done when I was on active duty. The process and all of the scanning was done by Contractors, who of course, are the lowest bidder & pay their scanners minimum wages. It was a massive undertaking, and yes, many mis-filed documents. Quality Assurance can only go so far!!!!!

I wonder, will we ever have access to our scanned documents, or get a disc copy of the files?

[Chuck75]

It was the VA's stated original intent to totally eliminate paper claim files. The details on what happened to the paper file were not discussed.

If the VA follows other agencies behavior, at some point the paper files will be destroyed.

DoD had problems with a similar process some decades ago. Turned out that full page by page checks had not been done.

The digital copies were, at times,incomplete and/or partially unreadable. This seriously impacted procurement of replacement parts, and research

to identify substitutes for things that were no longer made.

[USMC_VET]

Scan everything. Then once done, i dont care about it being put back together properly, just put it ALL in a box and send it to us.

I also think that when VA employees talk internally via email, instant messaging that it needs to be part of the record for your c file.

Edited July 31, 2015 by USMC_VET

[Pete53]

How does not being in communication expedite your claim.

[vern2]

I would like to comment on the Federal governnment going paperless. I worked for the DoD for 30 years and in last 5 years we were told to not keep any files over 120 days. We had to buy an industrial size shredder to shred all the files. Hope they do not need them in future!! BTW: This was Air Force.

Did this save any time or money? Hell no! We had to document everything electronically and upload on servers, which can crash! Maybe in long run will save a few trees, but not save time or manpower. JMHO