American Legion recommends that Congress pass a bill that would require VA to provide more specific information on the status of benefits claims and appeals in its online Monday Morning Workload Report.
The rising backlog of benefits claims appeals at the Department of Veterans Affairs’ Board of Veterans Appeals (BVA) was the focus of a House subcommittee hearing on Sept. 10.
During fiscal 2014, the number of benefits claims decisions appealed by veterans increased by more than 21,000 – bringing the current total of appeals waiting for adjudication (as of Sept. 8) to 280,297.
The American Legion submitted testimony for the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigation’s hearing, “Metrics, Measurements and Mismanagement at the Board of Veterans Appeals.” Zachary Hearn, the Legion’s deputy director for benefits, was among the panelists who testified.
Through Sept. 1 of fiscal 2014, American Legion employees working at BVA handled 8,366 claims appeals. Of those, 2,330 previous denials were overturned and benefits were awarded; another 3,904 appeals were sent back (remanded) to VA regional offices for further development.
Thus, the decisions made for 74.5 percent of appeals the Legion worked on were deemed to be incorrect by BVA. While many denials were overturned, more were remanded because they were inadequately developed and prematurely denied by VA claims adjudicators.
Hearn told the subcommittee in his prepared remarks that veterans’ claims appeals “are often remanded two, three or even more times prior to having a claim finally adjudicated. Quite simply, this is unacceptable. As has been widely discussed, veterans are having to wait extended periods of time for original decisions. Combine this fact with years of waiting for a claim to be adjudicated by the BVA, and it is understandable why veterans become frustrated.”
The American Legion has repeatedly testified to Congress regarding the need for VA to improve its accuracy in the adjudication of VA disability claims at the regional offices. The Legion’s Regional Office Action Review (ROAR) program evaluates annually the quality of VA claims processing. The accuracy rates determined by ROAR are typically much lower than the 90th-percentile accuracy rates posted by the Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA).
In its testimony, The American Legion recommended that Congress pass a bill that would require VA to provide more specific information on the status of benefits claims and appeals in its online Monday Morning Workload Report. Data from the BVA needs to be broken down into grant, remand and denial rates per each VBA regional office.
“It is evident we must continue to press to ensure that VA improves its accuracy of disability claims,” Hearn said. “For the errors made today have long-lasting, deleterious effects upon our nation’s veterans and their families.”
Read The American Legion's written testimony here.
- Veterans Benefits