Readers of Tom Philpott's Military Update column sound off.

With Evidence Submitted, Vets Still Wait and Wait

Your column was right on the nose about the 30 to 60 days of block waiting [periods required under the Veterans Claims Assistance Act].

The sad part is if you send records requested by the VA in two or three days after you get a letter, it doesn’t matter; they are not going to look at your case again until 60 days have passed.

For example, VA sends you a letter dated April 12, 2008. You get it around the April 15 and take three days to gather your items and send them forward. VA receives your documents around April 19. VA will not do anything with that information until after June 12 or later.

And once you have sent them everything they requested, you still have to write on the forms or in a letter that you have nothing else and that they should go head and process your claim. Without you telling them that, it too sits until they think they have everything. That's the part of the system that is broken for sure.

Every case, they say, is different. But this is what happened in my case, though the dates are different. But I'm still waiting for them to process my claim and I've been out of service since December 2007.

ANNA E. HOLLAND
Panama City, FLA.

I have been working my own disability claim for some time now. In recent years I had gotten into the habit of replying to "statements of the case" and "duty to assist" letters within a couple of days. I have complied with VA's request for information and evidence and release forms.

More recently, I have simply stated that all evidence pertinent to my claim has been submitted. It seems to me that ought to absolve VA of its duty to assist and to conclude that I am waiving my right to the remainder of the 60 or 90 day waiting period they are obligated to provide.

But it seems such statements and waivers "fall on deaf ears" as they make repeated requests for the same information, or I receive no communication long past the waiting period which I have waived.

With each redundant request for information, there is another 60-day waiting period tacked on. It seems VA is using the mandate of the VCAA to delay adjudication of claims, presumably in the hope that the veteran will simply become frustrated and give up, or die waiting.

That last statement may seem "paranoid" but I suspect it is a commonly held belief among veterans frustrated by VA claims and appeals that drag on for periods as long as 10 or 12 years.

The VCAA is a good law, made necessary as the VA unfairly denied more and more claims or made egregious errors adjudicating them. What was intended to be a non-adversarial area of the law increasingly had bee more adversarial and hostile to claimants who were supposed to be afforded the "benefit-of-the-doubt."

The problem now appears to be a two-faced administration that purports to "support the troops" and then denies them their due once it has extracted from them what it needed.

RON FRADKIN
Former Staff Sergeant, USAF (1967-71)
Via e-mail

I worked the last seven of my 20 years for Disabled American Veterans at the Columbia, S.C., VA Regional Office. I was transferred there from the San Francisco VARO where claims were taking several months to process if all evidence was timely received.

In Columbia I was astounded to see that original claims took only a couple of months to complete. Reopened claims took less time and notification letters were sent to claimants the day the decision was made or one day later. If sufficient evidence existed to grant benefits, then a decision was made even if all the evidence was not yet received.

It was reputed the Columbia VARO was the second most efficient in the country. VA employees there were handling backlogged cases from North Carolina, Alabama, Florida, Georgia or even Texas.

Then the VA Central Office in Washington D.C. examined how Columbia became so productive. It was tracked to the office's policy of granting benefits with possible disregarded for procedure. Columbia was chastised and forced to operate the same way the backlogged VAROs operated. To no one's surprise, time to process claims lengthened and veterans' complaints increased. It ended an era of at least one VARO operating to "grant where we can and deny when we must!"

Adjudication teams were created; different titles bestowed; employees were cross-trained to get a better overall understanding of the claims process. One result was that claims clerks who secure evidence and develop cases before sending them to the Rating Board were sent to learn other jobs while their own work piled up. So the Rating Board was required to wait months for a single piece of evidence that would have no probative value or impact on the decision under the guise of affording "due process."

It has not improved there, according to feedback I get from veterans.

Giving each regional office the latitude to handle its own regional peculiarities, rather than subject them to iron-clad procedures, was the right and most efficient way to process claims. Perhaps a return to the hands-on personal method, as was done in Columbia in the early 90's, is called for.

Otherwise, I fear, the claims backlog is only going to get worse.

STANTON LORE
Columbia, S.C.

My husband, Murice A. Turner, has been waiting for a decision on VA benefits for more than five years. His claim at first was denied. It then went before a judge who overturned the denial and the claim was reopened.

The judge wanted the case expedited because the original injury occurred in 1975 while my husband was in the Air Force. Murice has had appointments, rating exams and filled out numerous forms. He's still waiting. He receives $117 a month and is totally disabled.

Frustrating? You have no idea.

LILLIAN TURNER
Phoenix, Ariz.

I take a whole different approach to this VCAA time issue. We are disabled veterans and can't function as quickly as many folks. I can't even remember some of the doctors and such research takes time.

What provision takes care of us?

CHRIS ALLEN
Fort Worth, Texas

I see the VA motto -- "Stall, deny, and hope they die!" -- is still the order of the day!

FRANK EHRMANTRAUT
Via e-mail

Letters may be edited for clarity or length. Write to Military Forum, P.O. Box 231111, Centreville, VA 20120-1111, send e-mail to militaryforum@aol.com or visit www.militaryupdate.com.