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VBA'S NEW HIRING PLANS ARE JUST LIPSTICK ON A PIG --

Veterans' Advocate Jim Strickland: "Be prepared for longer

waits [and] more errors in your claims...from that most

inefficient of all government agencies, your VBA."

Veterans' Advocate Jim Strickland provides regular columns for VA Watchdog dot Org.

If you would like to contact Jim about his columns, you can email him here...

The archive of Jim's articles is here...

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The headline blared, “VA FALLS FURTHER BEHIND IN PROCESSING CLAIMS, BUT SAYS THEY'RE DOING BETTER”

Read the article here http://vawatchdog.org/07/nf07/nfNOV07/nf112907-1.htm

The article goes on to tell us that, “the agency lost ground for the third year in a row” and that VBA (Veterans' Benefits Administration) “has made no progress in improving its performance in more than half of what it lists as its key goals.” When she learned of this Senator Patty Murray, a member of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee, had the good sense to say, “I want to say I’m surprised. But I’m not.”

But many others seem shocked and awed that this could be happening.

After all, hasn't the Department of Veterans Affairs (DVA) promised reforms? In this article the reporter says that, “The VA said this week that it was aggressively tackling the issue, hiring more than 1,000 workers, boosting overtime and revamping training.”

There's nothing new here. The DVA has repeatedly made promises, spoke soothingly to a naive and confused Congress and held its fingers crossed behind its back as it promised improvements. A short history lesson proves that.

In March 2007 there was, "VA continues to face challenges in improving service delivery to veterans, specifically speeding up the process of adjudication and appeal, and reducing the existing backlog of claims." http://www.gao.g
ov/docsearch/abstract.php?rptno=GAO-07-562T

Another March 2007 report says, "GAO has reported and testified on this subject on numerous occasions. VA continues to face challenges in improving service delivery to veterans, specifically in speeding up the process of adjudication and appeal, reducing the existing backlog of claims, and improving the accuracy and consistency of decisions." http://www.
gao.gov/docsearch/abstract.php?rptno=GAO-07-512T

In December of 2005 another GAO report tells us, "For years, the claims process has been the subject of concern and attention within VA and by the Congress and veterans service organizations. Their concerns include long waits for decisions, large claims backlogs, and inaccurate decisions." http://ww
w.gao.gov/docsearch/abstract.php?rptno=GAO-06-283T

Then another in 2005 wants us to know, "VA Could Enhance Its Progress in Complying with Court Decision on Disability Criteria"
http://www.gao.gov/docsearch/abstract.php?rptno=GAO-06-46

Moving back in time to 2004 GAO says, "In the past, we have reported concerns about possible inconsistencies in the disability decisions made by the 57 regional offices of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). In 2002, we reported that VA did not systematically assess the consistency of decision making for any specific impairments included in veterans' disability claims."
http://www.gao.gov/docsearch/abstract.php?rptno=GAO-05-99
 
In more innocent times before 9/11 caused us so much pain, this GAO report of August 2001 lets us learn, "Congress, the Department of Veterans Affairs, and veterans service organizations have all raised concerns about the accuracy of claims processing in the Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA)."
http://www.gao.gov/docsearch/abstract.php?rptno=GAO-01-930R

And so it goes.

Senator Murray wasn't surprised at the lack of progress from DVA? I should hope not. The only surprise would be any positive news from that organization.

Even the DVA itself seems to wonder why they can't catch up. We're told, “The agency also said it was receiving more disability claims than it had at any time in recent history and that it had received more than it had expected in 2007.”

I've come to the conclusion that since the DVA can't figure out why there are so many claims and the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee remains as clueless as usual, it's up to me to set the record straight. I know what's happening and why. It's really pretty simple to unravel the mystery and it's easy to accurately predict that it's going to get worse, much worse.

There are only 2 factors that are affecting the tremendous increase of claims being filed.

The first piece of the problem the VBA must face is that Veterans from WWII and the Vietnam era are pissed off and they aren't going to take it any more. Then there's the Internet.

We've forgotten what life was like before the Internet. Only a decade ago, if we wanted information about almost anything, we spent hours making telephone calls (from land lines), writing letters (using stamps), seeking out brochures, maybe even going to a public library for research. To use a search engine wasn't yet something we thought of as being a simple routine. Google wasn't a company and "to Google" as in; “I Googled it up and got 521,054 hits” hadn't become a common action.

A decade ago and back beyond that, if a Veteran wanted to file a claim with the VA and receive a disability benefit, he or she rarely knew where to begin. We would often seek out a Veterans Service Officer in the Yellow Pages and make appointments and wait and fill out some papers and wait some more.

Many Veterans just couldn't be bothered with it all. They knew by the grapevine that no matter what they did they were likely to be denied. The process was adversarial and denigrating. I recall a personal hearing of my own in the early 1980's when I was humiliated by a member of the committee. He all but accused me of being a leech on society and and was very vocal that my records showed nothing I claimed. My “Service Officer” sat quietly and had nothing to say and I wasn't allowed but a few words myself before the meeting was closed. I lost, of course and didn't go back for almost 15 years.

But now it's 2007, we have high speed Internet access and knowledge, all the knowledge in the world. It's right at our fingertips. And many of us are very angry about the treatment we received from our VA those many years ago. In a way, filing and filing again brings some satisfaction for the way we were treated all these years.

So we're filing claims. Tens of thousands of claims. The burden on the VA is steadily increasing because so many of us are taking back what was rightly ours in the first place. I eventually won that claim that was denied me back then. It took me until 2006 to win it but by God, I did. The VBA could have and should have given me what I had earned and what I was owed back then. They didn't, I got smart and learned how to fight and I increased their workload and I won. I'm now filing a CUE claim that will take me back to my original date of denial in 1971.

Am I pissed off about the treatment I received back then? You bet I am. Do I want justice? Oh yeah I do.

I'm telling others to file for their legitimate claims and they're telling even more people and they're telling more people. The message is spreading like wildfire...file your claims. If you're denied, appeal. If your appeal is denied, appeal that appeal. The Veteran has nothing to lose and everything to gain.

The recent proliferation of Internet sites, particularly of those where experienced Vets give advice to less experienced Vets is a phenomenon that VBA couldn't have predicted. How could they have known that [Internet sites] would crop up and have thousands of Veterans registered, networking and sharing their VBA claims experiences with each other every day? Every morning I see a new site promising to help fellow Vets with disability claims.

(This is a good time to caution you that not all of these sites provide good info that you can trust. As with all things on the Internet, proceed with caution and don't give out personal information unless you're sure you can depend on the guy at the other end.)

What are we filing for? Everything under the sun. Not so long ago most of us would have hesitated to file for a skin condition or an arthritic joint...it just wasn't very macho. Today we proudly shout out our erectile dysfunction issues to anyone who will listen and then we file for it, macho be damned. Do you have heartburn? VBA may award you a payment for GERD. The knee that was twisted during basic training may reap you an extra couple hundred dollars each month...file for it. Is your hearing off a bit and the ringing in your ears never went away after that grenade went off near you? Hey, that sounds like 20% to me.

Does your butt hurt?

A few months ago the headline was “VA DISABILITY BENEFITS FROM HEMORRHOIDS TO SHAVING BUMPS”

Read it here http://www.vawatchdog.org/07/nf07/nfMAR07/nf032907-8.htm

The article is typical of its ilk and goes on to blame the Veterans who are filing for such minor maladies as hemorrhoids for all the tremendous backlog and extraordinary expense of running the VBA. The problems of the VA aren't the fault of a Congress that won't timely fund the system nor inept DVA Secretaries who swing through a revolving door to accomplish nothing during their tenure.

According to this article, the problems at DVA today are the fault of the Veteran with hemorrhoids.

The presumably non-Veteran reporter who wrote this pap and nonsense, sharing his derogatory opinions of our minor ailments with us, lists a long range of conditions that he doesn't see as being service connected. I'm not sure why but he focuses on our sore and bloody backsides as an example of how we're taking advantage of the system.

I'd enjoy the opportunity to chat with him some day, riding along for days on end in a convoy sitting on a stiff wooden bench in ancient deuce and a half truck loaded with ammunition and weapons. There aren't many nice, clean restrooms along your route so you hold in that urge. Eating your K Rations, C Rations or MRE's don't do much for developing regular bathroom habits either.

I'd want him to talk to a recon radioman who spends 7 days in the jungle on patrol, aware that to leave behind a remnant of his stool for the enemy to find is a good way to get killed. I still hear it today...in that jungle the VC could smell an American 100 yards off. Maybe our reporter could talk to a long range bomber pilot. He's refueled in the air 3 times already on a mission that will keep him in the cockpit, buzzed on amphetamines, for 36 straight hours. Yeah, you knew that speed was handed out like Tic Tacs back then, does that writer know that?

I can imagine that the tank crew that made their way across a frozen piece of German soil sitting for weeks on their icy metal seats would have a word about whether or not hemorrhoids are a service connected disability.

I don't recall that I had keys to an executive washroom or a supply of neat little packets of Metamucil to help those rations pass through.

Are hemorrhoids often service connected? You bet your sweet...bippy...they are.

Are we filing for those hemorrhoids and erectile dysfunction and hearing loss and frozen feet and diabetes and foot fungus's and uterine fibroids and fibromyalgia and broken toes? Oh yeah, and we're going to keep on filing for those and even more. You bet we are. We earned it and we're going to get it.

Those Vets returning from Iraq today understand more than we ever did about getting information to help themselves. The average soldier fighting in Iraq today doesn't remember life without the Internet. Trying to explain to the young soldier that we weren't able to file a claim on the Internet at the VONAPP site from a wireless laptop at Starbucks is as quaint to him as our foolish tales of having to get up and walk across the living room to change a channel on our black and white TV set.

Unlike we Vietnam era Veterans and even more different than the WWII Vet, the recent graduates of the military experience are going to demand exactly what was promised to them...and they're going to have thousands of us coaching them to get it. The VBA can expect that the great majority of recent Veterans will file claims and we're going to show them how.

Will the VBA ever get caught up? No. Not until they change their way of doing business.

Their methods of processing claims are as outdated as the ratings schedule itself. Only a government bureaucracy like the VBA would be able to look you in the eye and tell you that they're content using a disability ratings table that was first developed in 1945 and hasn't changed since. Their computer systems are antiques, their management styles are left over from another century and their smug satisfaction in their untouchability is an insult to every Veteran.

We read on in that article to see; “The VA said this week that it was aggressively tackling the issue, hiring more than 1,000 workers, boosting overtime and revamping training.”

Will 1,000 more VA workers solve anything?

I was discussing this with one of my highly respected VBA “Insider” employees not long ago.

I emailed him, “I believe we could hire and add 10,000 new bodies to VBA next week and it still wouldn't help. It's the process that needs change.”

His reply said it all. “Ironically, most experienced VA employees agree with you. They see the current massive hiring as lipstick on a pig. First, the training will take years and then you'll have an even larger number of employees invested in the 'old way' of doing things. Sigh!!”

While the newest temporarily permanent DVA Secretary and his underlings are busy prettying up that pig, the future for Veterans filing claims will only get worse. Be prepared for longer waits, more errors in your claims and more non-surprises from that most inefficient of all government agencies, your VBA.

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Larry Scott  --

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